Mad
by xxxsaltinexxx
Summary: Deidara, a test subject at a nearby experimentation laboratory gets a new roommate. Namely, Sasori. Gore, shounen-ai, and sasodei  Please read and review :3
1. Prologue

I pressed the ragged cloth that was once a pair of pants against my leg in a rather pathetic attempt to stop the now profuse bleeding. It had been soaked through within the first two minutes of receiving my injury, and for some reason, I still expected it to help me. All I was doing now was assuring myself some sort of infection. I tried to tell myself that it was working, and that I wasn't getting a headache from the blood loss, and that I wasn't beginning to see odd colors and shapes and…

I shook my head violently. If I passed out now, that would be it. I'd lose consciousness, and probably my life. And let me tell you; dying in the cold, stone cell that I called my own wasn't exactly high on my wish list. No one would notice if I died here, not until my body drained itself through this blasted cut, and rats and bugs came to feast on my rotting flesh. It'd be a few days before anyone realized I was gone. They'd come in for my weekly examination, and rather than finding me counting cracks on the wall like usual, they'd find a rotting corpse that the rats had already picked their way through.

I suppose that would be a nice way to pay them back for all the crap they've been giving me over the past few months. and Nova would certainly be upset to find that they could no longer play with their little test subject. "What could they do to me after I'm dead?" There wouldn't be anymore pain… "They wouldn't be able to do anything to me, un…" I whispered, and an absolutely insane feeling swept over me. If my life depended on it, I could never describe to you how absolutely _mad_ I felt. No matter how hard I tried to suppress it, a smile broke out on my face.

Now, when the metal door to my cell swung open, that should have been an indication for me to seriously attempt to calm down. What happened instead, however, was that it sent me completely over the edge. I began laughing. Laughing, and laughing, and laughing…

One of the guards from outside approached me and slapped me across the face. But no, that didn't stop it, either. He grabbed a handful of my hair and pulled me onto my feet, cursing at me. Something should have clicked in my mind to tell me that I was in danger. Rather, I found myself gasping for breath. He punched me in the stomach, and my body jerked forward. Another punch, and I was on the ground trying to breathe.

Noticing that his attempts were futile, he spat at me and muttered some sort of profanity under his breath before exiting the room and slamming the metal door of my cell behind him.

"Looks like they put me with a madman." At the sound of another humans voice, my head snapped up and I was able to cease my laughing long enough to observe the person sitting in front of me. The blood dripping from his mouth was almost the same color as his hair. He sat in the corner of the room, watching my every move. Typical. No different from everyone else they threw in here. I pulled myself onto my feet and approached him. When he showed no indication of being uncomfortable, I smirked.

"What's your name, un?" I inquired, poking him in the middle of the forehead. He scowled at me, but said nothing. "Aren't you going to answer me?" He stared at me, and just as I was about to give up, he sighed and grabbed my hand.

"Sasori. If you ever touch me again, I'll snap your fingers off." I looked into his eyes to see how serious he was. No indication of fear, confusion, concern…anything. Rather, I saw boredom, and something that told me he wasn't joking.

I smiled at him and pulled my hand away. "My name's Deidara, un."

He was going to be fun to mess with.


	2. Chapter 1

Long, blonde hair and bright blue eyes. He had one of them covered, but the other shone whenever he spoke, clearly showing his emotions. Just like an open book. His slim, muscle-less figure gave him an almost female look, and…

I never thought I would meet anyone this utterly _obnoxious_ in my entire life.

Apparently, it wasn't bad enough that these people had to forcefully remove me from my home and bring me to this disaster of a place. No, they just _had_ to throw me in with this brat. I never knew it was possible for a human being to talk this much. And on top of that, ask so many useless, ridiculous questions. What happened? Why are you here? Do you know anyone here? Have you ever painted before? What's your favorite color?

Gah! Why did it even matter to him? If he didn't stop, I was going to lose what little patience I had managed to hold on to up until now. I closed my eyes, silently counting to ten. I had heard that it helps relieve stress, but unfortunately it did absolutely nothing for me.

When I was dragged in here only to find him in hysterics, I had a feeling something was off. And I really noticed that something was up when one of the men started to punch him, and rather than cry out, he plunged deeper into his laughing fit. Not exactly what I had expected.

He continued talking, and I began grinding my teeth together. There wasn't much else I could do, really. If I beat him up, that would probably only make him talk more.

"How much money did they pay you to come here, un?" Opening my eyes ever so slowly, I shot him a confused look. Money? They discussed no such thing with me before dragging me here. It was something closer to a death threat, followed by a few gun shots.

"…None?" I replied, only to have him raise a brow at my answer. Something told me that I had missed quite a bit of information. The confusion on Deidara's face slowly melted into what looked like distress, and then rage.

He ran a hand through his hair and stared straight into my eyes, almost as if he were searching for something. "Are you serious, un?" his voice came out much quieter than I expected, and I found myself straining to hear him.

"Do I look like I'm joking?" I inquired, only to have him stare at me before shaking his head "no." I couldn't figure out quite why this angered him so much. Evidently, the circumstances were much different for each person here. Honestly, I had just figured that everyone was dragged here against their will.

"That's low, un."

I smirked and rested my chin on one of my knees. "Oh?" The fact that he implied having even a slight bit of regard for human feelings and life interested me. Really, it shouldn't have. But someone showing that they cared (especially for someone such as myself) was amusing, to say the least. I was pretty sure I could change that attitude in less than a day.

He shrugged and shook his head. "I was offered money to come here, as well as most of the people that are experimented on, un. Even though we weren't prepared for it, we got ourselves into this mess." Oh. Why didn't I expect him to say that? Why did I expect him to say something about how it was so horrifying that they took me without any sort of warning, and about how my parents were so worried, and how everyone was going to be looking for me.

Okay, maybe I'm over exaggerating a bit here. But anyway, the fact that he didn't seem to be too concerned about my well being was somewhat reassuring. Not having someone constantly breathing down my neck and worrying about me sounded delightful, actually.

However, that still didn't help my situation at hand. The fact that I was in here without any logical explanation, along with the fact that I still had no idea as to what they were going to do to me didn't comfort me.

"Why am I here?" I asked calmly, hoping that it wasn't nearly as bad as I was expecting. After seeing Deidara bleed all over the floor with no reasonable explanation was not reassuring me in the least. And, of course, that everyone seemed to completely disregard the injury.

He then proceeded to give the fakest smile I had ever seen. "Experimentation, un," he chirped. I'm not sure if he knew, but I saw him reach down and brush his fingers over the cut in his thigh. Having only begun to heal over, it looked disgusting.

For a moment, I considered not saying anything and letting him continue on with his fake attitude towards the entire thing. Let him keep his wall up to try and protect himself until they came back. No, I couldn't do that. "You seem to take it awfully lightly," I began, only to have him flash me that same fake smile and shrug. _Just you try and use that fake smile on me._ "I assumed that getting your leg sliced open would cause you to think otherwise, but I suppose-"

"It's awful, un!"

He snapped so easily that actually found it somewhat concerning. I was fully prepared to drop as many bombs as I needed to in order to wipe that smile off of his face. I expected it to take a few minutes…not around thirty seconds. "Now that you seem to be taking this more seriously…what am I going to want to expect?" He frowned at me and looked away rather than giving me an answer. "Well?"

"They perform surgery on me a lot, and if they don't, they inject something into my blood. No matter what I do, they refuse to tell me what it is, and…" he stopped for a moment, turning his head away from me. When he looked back, he bit down on his lip and I sighed. This wasn't good. "You'll have Nova and Delsin, too," he whispered.

Without giving me any information on who they were, the only conclusion I could draw was that they evidently weren't the most pleasant people to be around."Who?" He didn't answer me. Deidara went to look away again, and I slammed my fist against the wall.

I can easily say I've never seen anyone jump like that. Afraid, and I was nowhere near him. "Deidara, look at me," I demanded, keeping my voice steady. My patience was running out. If I had to keep forcing answers out of him like this, I wasn't going to be able to take it much longer.

The blond looked at me again, and my jaw very nearly dropped. His visible eye, calm only moments before, was widened and his pupils dilated.

Crazed.

"Calm down." Was the only thing I could manage to say to him. Stop it. Think about something else.

"Have you ever met a sadist before, un?" I shook my head, and he smirked at me. "They're going to tear you apart."


	3. Chapter 2

I didn't expect Sasori to seem so shocked when I mentioned Nova and Delsin. When I first began to explain, a nervous, almost apprehensive look crossed his face. And on top of that, he told me over and over again to "Calm down," or "Think about something else," as if these things were giving me bad memories. Of course not! After a while, you get used to the whole thing; blood dripping all over the floor, surgeons beating you until your skin turns black and blue if you scream, and "accidentally" slicing part of your body if you scream, causing even more blood to…um…

…Maybe there's just a little bit of resentment hanging around.

Smirking, I lifted one of my shaking hands and rested it on his shoulder. "Have you ever seen someone have surgery, un?" I whispered, chuckling softly as he tensed up. I could not, however, figure out whether it was because I was now touching him, or because of what I was saying. The redhead shook his head, and I pretended to be shocked. Most of the protected little outsiders hadn't even considered watching such a thing. Too disgusting for their eyes to handle. "It's not too bad…unless it's your blood spilling everywhere rather than the kid across the hall, un."

Before I could say another word, Sasori's hands were against my chest, pushing me away from him. Rather than letting him, I grabbed hold of his wrists and pinned him to the ground. This was fantastic; having a roommate weaker than me for once. The last one…Hidan, I think his name was…could have knocked me out cold with one hand behind his back.

The redhead squirmed beneath me, swinging his legs violently in an attempt to escape. Not even a chance. Then, something resembling a screech tore through his lips, and something-presumably his knee-connected with my stomach. "You're insane!" he spat, and in that one moment, it seemed like time froze.

I should have known he was going to be one of _them_. None of _them_ actually understood what was going on. Freak. Crazy. Insane. Mad. I have, on numerous occasions, described my feelings with these words. However, I never intended for them to be used as something to describe _me_.

How did _they_ see me? Someone who the surgeons pushed a little too far, and now, I was too dangerous to put with any of the more valuable test subjects.

I was hoping Sasori was going to be different. Now, for only knowing him for about a day, this must seem like I gave him too much trust. But he seemed…different, almost. He didn't care, and no matter what I said, he didn't seem phased. Nothing seemed to matter to him.

I respected that attitude so much. I honestly thought that he wouldn't judge me. That he wouldn't do the same thing as everyone else and just…push me away without a chance.

Fine. I'd just show him how "insane" I could be. I forced some sort of deformed laugh out, and my lips twisted into a crooked smile. "I'll kill you, un!" I squeezed Sasori's wrists, harder and harder until his mouth opened, but no sound came out. His eyes bugged out, and for a moment, I thought they were about to pop out of his stupid little head. "What's wrong, Sasori?" I hissed, slamming his hands against the ground. "Am I going to crush your wrists, un? I wonder how long it'll take me to pull them off of your body."

"Don't," he gasped out, still trying to pull away from me. He should have known that it was useless. The redhead grimaced again, and I sighed. This was getting boring already.

And then, I wondered what would happen if I choked him. Without another moment of thought, I released his arms and wrapped my fingers around his throat. At first, I only squeezed a little bit…just enough to cut off his breath. I could see panic sweep over his face, and it was hilarious. Giggling, I began squeezing harder, and his hands latched onto my arms. Mouthing "stop" or "you're killing me" did him little good. Of course I knew I was killing him. I wouldn't have started cutting off his airway without thinking about that. "Do you still think I'm insane?" I managed to get out between fits of laughter. "There's nothing wrong with me. It's just you and everyone else that doesn't understand," I whispered, smiling at him again.

It's a shame that he didn't seem to pay much attention to my words. Rather, he began clawing at my arms, probably hoping that he'd be able to stop me. Nah. Maybe if he passed out, I'd get bored again. But watching his face turn red, then slowly start to get a tint of purple…It was hilarious, really. "I'll kill you, un," I whispered again.

You know, I didn't exactly expect him to kick me in the ribs when I said that. Nor did I expect him to pry me off of him and then proceed to tackle me. Somehow, he threw himself forward, and our heads smashed against each other. I winced, and went to move my hand up to my forehead.

"I don't think so." Sasori murmured, pinning my arms on either side of me. He was still breathing heavily, and I could see sweat beginning to form along his hairline. "Now, would you like to explain to me what the _hell_ you were thinking?" I frowned, searching his face for a sign that he didn't actually want me to answer. But despite how long I spent searching, he was completely serious.

"What, un?" I replied innocently. I didn't expect it to work, so when he scowled and seized me by the chin, I wasn't all that surprised. What did surprise me was when the redhead let his hand fall back to his side not even a moment later. I rose a brow, and he sighed.

"This isn't going to get me anywhere. I don't know why I expected you to give me a straight answer, brat," he said calmly, letting his other arm fall. "You're tiring me out."

Brat. Brat, brat, _brat_. The word hung in the air laughing, mocking me. _You're nothing but a little brat, Deidara,_ I said silently. "Fine, un," I whispered, closing my eyes. I couldn't believe I was about to tell him. Tell him everything that had ever been wrong. A complete stranger. "Do you want me to tell you 'what the hell is wrong with me', un? Fine. I'll do it." I opened my eyes for a moment to see him look at me with the same bored expression, before closing them once more. He asked me, but I knew very well that the redhead was going to completely disregard everything I was about to say. "Nothing. There is absolutely nothing wrong with me, un. Do you know how many people have come in and out of this room? I've had at least five people in the past few months. They'll come in, think I'm funny and easy to talk to, and then…they're gone, un. Why? Because we fight. I get back from an experiment, something 'insane' slips out of my mouth, and that's it." I took another deep breath. "They never give me a chance. Just because I'm not the same as them, un. And I don't even know what-"

Before I could finish, Sasori pressed his hand over my mouth. Evidently, he had heard enough. Didn't even let me finish…bastard. And now he was probably going to say I was wrong, and that I didn't know what I was talking about, because I was too crazy to think straight. "I'm sorry."

…What?

My eyes widened. I must have misheard him. There was no way that he had just…_apologized_. "Excuse me, un?"

Sasori rolled his eyes. "I'm sorry, brat. I didn't know you're so sensitive about it, okay?" The whole thing took quite some time for me to get straight. He said he was sorry…for calling me insane…but why?

I frowned, and for the first time since he arrived, I was thrown into a spiral of confusion. "I…don't understand, un," I murmured, shaking my head as I tried to figure it out. He wasn't really sorry. He just wanted me to stop freaking out at him.

"I'm sorry for calling you insane. What more do you want me to tell you?" the redhead inquired. "I don't really have anything else." I thought about it, and…I didn't know. I didn't have any idea as to what I expected him to say.

I shrugged and tried to smile at him. "Well-"

The metal door of our cell swung open, clattering loudly against the stone wall and completely cutting me off. The garish hall lights shone in, and I tried to shield my eyes. In the doorway stood Nova with his messy brown hair, and I almost immediately began cursing to myself. Of all the people that had to come in and get us for our experiments, it had to be _him_. The only one that actually enjoyed watching the test subjects try to struggle and flee before he dragged them into one of the surgical rooms.

An amused look crossed his face, and I could only imagine what he was going to say. "Are you kidding me? Normally you're usually at your roommate's throat. Interesting change of pace, Deidara," he commented, eyeing Sasori, and then me. Pervert. "And I thought you were holding yourself out for a lady-"

Sasori (thankfully) interrupted before he could finish that thought. "Don't worry, we were killing each other," he explained, getting off of me as he did so.

Nova gave us a smile that very nearly screamed how little he believed us. "Right. Now, if you remember correctly, today's an experimentation day. Be sure that Sasori knows all of the rules before he gets there. I wouldn't want there to be any sort of…accident."

I glanced at said redhead, who seemed to be watching Nova intently. He reacted to everything, whether it be a blink of the eye or moving to adjust how he was standing. "I'm sure I'll be fine," he replied icily, and I couldn't help but wince.

"Tell me, boy. Do you value your ability to speak?" the brunette inquired, the fake smile falling from his face. "Because if I hear another word from you, I'll be happy to cut your tongue right out of your mouth."


	4. Chapter 3

I'm sure that when Nova stormed into the room and essentially dragged us out to go into experimentation, I should have been a lot more worried than I was at the time. Especially since one of the first things he said to me that was if I spoke another word, he'd "be happy to cut my tongue right out of my mouth."

Now, even though this wasn't exactly the greatest first impression, I was too busy thinking about what had almost happened only minutes before. More specifically, Deidara nearly killing me. If he hadn't been stupid enough to completely forget to hold my legs down, I would have been gone. It seemed that the concept had never come to mind, due to the look of pure shock that crossed his face when I kicked him off and pinned him.

I'm going to be perfectly honest and say that he frightened me much more than Nova. Not only was he violent, he switched from one extreme mood to the other in seconds. At first, when he pounced on me, I couldn't figure out for the life of me why it had happened. Did I say something, or did he finally snap?

And around the time my head started to throb and my life was fading away, I figured it out; He really was insane. What set him off was that one little comment I made. I hadn't even thought about it when I said it. Never had I met someone that freaked out over such a simple word.

On the other hand, I can't say I've met anyone else with the same level of mental instability as Deidara. Lethal, severe mood swings, and I could very well be stuck in the same room as him for the rest of my life. It frightened me, really. The thought of walking on nails for the rest of my life, constantly fearing for my life thanks to my roommate's instability was certainly not something I looked forward to.

But I couldn't just leave him there. Deidara explicitly told me that the same thing had happened to everyone else that had to stay with him (can't imagine why) and they all ended up leaving. While I completely understood the reason, I couldn't help but feel…guilty, almost.

Which made little to no sense. Why did I care all of a sudden? Was he so utterly desperate for company that I couldn't bring myself to leave him? No. That would be stupid. The boy was lonely, but not attention hungry. If I decided to leave, he would have been fine. Or at least that's what I kept telling myself. There was no reason for me to stay if I felt uncomfortable.

Maybe if it happened again I'd beg them to move me. Taking action so suddenly would probably result in more disaster. And speaking of disaster, Nova was talking to me, and I hadn't heard a word of what he had said. Too busy staring at his back, I guess.

"For your first experiment, you'll just get an injection, followed by a few surgical procedures so that we can get a few…pieces…of you to look at after we send you back," Nova murmured, digging his hands deep into the stereotypical white jacket he wore. How had he managed not to get a single drop of blood on it? I found the concept of having multiple jackets or whatever to be ridiculous, especially if they were just going to get dirtied.

I stayed silent and let him lead me down the halls. There was nothing much to stare at; pallid walls with a few lights screwed poorly to the top, and dirty off white floors. No windows to look out at, probably because they didn't want anyone looking in.

When I realized that the brunette had stopped talking, I cleared my throat. "Pardon, but what might you be injecting into me?" I inquired, speeding up so that I was walking right next to him. From the corner of my eye, I could see Deidara reach out as if to pull me back, but I ignored him. What I should have done was taken that as a hint that I shouldn't have gotten anywhere near him.

And rather than giving me a verbal response, Nova stopped, spun on his heel to face me, and struck me across the face with such force that I stumbled backwards in to the wall. One of my hands shot up to my face, cradling my now stinging cheek. "You are _never_ to question my actions. Do you understand?" he hissed, slamming his fist against the wall only centimeters from my head. I took a deep breath to keep myself calm, only to get slapped once more.

This wasn't good. I nodded, and without a chance to compose myself, Nova grabbed me by the wrist and proceeded to drag me into what I guessed was probably the experimentation room. It looked exactly the same as the hallways, except for the faded stains on the floor that I could no doubt tell was from blood. "Deidara, show him to the showers and get back out here in five minutes." Said blond nodded and pulled me through a small white door parallel to the one we had just come through.

The bathroom was completely covered in tile, and it took quite a bit of effort not to think about the last time they had been cleaned. A single shower nozzle hung from one of the walls, with a drain underneath it and slanting floors to make sure that the water didn't go everywhere. Great.

As soon as the door clicked shut, Deidara let out a heavy sigh. "Are you trying to get yourself killed, un?" he spat, hitting me across the head. Under any other circumstance, I probably would have grabbed his hand and threatened to snap it off. However, I had more important things to worry about, such as keeping myself alive.

"I figured that wasn't going to end well," I muttered, watching Deidara pull off his shirt, only to reveal the most disgusting thing I think I had ever seen in my entire life; I could easily count his ribs all the way up his torso, and his stomach was almost nonexistent. No muscle, and his bones were knobby and clearly visible. I watched his joints move as he removed his pants, revealing knobby knees and sickly thin legs. No fat, no muscle, just skin and bones. On top of that, the deep gash from when I first arrived was still evident on his leg, and dried, flaking blood caked the pale skin around it.

I honestly had to keep myself from gagging. As I peeled off my own clothes, I struggled to keep from staring at his legs or his stomach as a sick fascination took over me. I shouldn't have wanted to keep looking and really, I didn't. But for some reason, I couldn't turn away no matter how hard I tried. "Sasori, you're staring, un."

That, however, was more than enough to make my head snap in the other direction. "Sorry." Damn it, could I have said anything worse? That was practically condemning my action. I could have at least attempted to deny what I was doing.

When I looked back at him, I saw him giving me a look that was either confusion or disgust. I rose a brow, and he sighed before turning the shower on. He opened his mouth as if to say something before closing it again. Open, close, open, close. Deidara did this a few times before sighing once more and stepping underneath the water. I could see goosebumps begin to form on his arms and legs, and I could only imagine how cold the water was. "You know, if you're going to admit to staring at me naked, you could at least try to justify it, un," he suggested, running a hand through his hair. "Also, you might want to shower off quickly. Nova's really impatient."

I closed my eyes for a moment before stepping next to Deidara, stifling a scream thanks to the temperature of the water. "Very well. Your lack of anything but skin and bones disgusted me, and due to some sort of sick fascination, I couldn't help but stare at you. Happy?"

He glanced at me for a moment before shrugging. "Fair enough, un." The two of us stood in complete silence, letting the frigid water hit our bodies. While the concept of bathing with another person wasn't exactly appealing to me, it wasn't as if it were something new. Often times, bath houses or anyplace that had a shower, really, would just be a public room, rather than separate stalls. Something our village was rather well known for, unfortunately.

It seemed like eternity before Deidara shut off the shower again, but by the time we were dressed back in our clothing, only about four minutes had passed. In a chair on the other side of the room, Nova sat reading a small book. At the sound of them coming from the room, he looked up at the two and smiled. "Well, it looks like you two got through that with minimal difficulty. Usually Deidei always has a bit of a problem when it comes to being naked in the same room as another man. He gets excited," he muttered, smirking like a madman as he spoke.

I rose a brow at the pet name and couldn't help but glance over at said blond, who's face was quickly turning a brilliant shade of red. "Shut _up_, you creep, un!" he screeched, only to have Nova stand up. I could already tell that Deidara was going to regret that.

I could also tell that I was not looking forward to having to deal with this pervert of a scientist, especially if he was going to make such nasty remarks. _Poor guy…_I said silently, biting my lip as the brunette advanced towards us.

Unfortunately, Nova seized me first and dragged me over to a scale and measuring stick like I had seen so many times before in the local hospital. 5.38 feet, 104.27 lbs. And with Deidara not even an inch taller than me, and about twice as skinny, I didn't even want to think about what he weighed. "Now, as I said before, you're just going to get a few injections, and a quick surgical procedure or two." If I remember correctly, it was only a single injection and only one procedure.

It probably went up because I asked about it. I made a note to myself never to mention it again in hopes that it may or may not help me in the future. Unlikely, much to my dismay. Nova strode across the room and grabbed a syringe with a pale green liquid that (pardon my vulgarity) looked like either vomit, or some sort of nasty bug guts. Not exactly something I wanted inside of me.

Before I could move to take a step back, the brunette seized me by the arm and took a stab at my arm with the syringe, not even bothering to aim at a vein. Either way, he hit something. I cried out, and he quickly forced the fluid into my system before pulling the syringe away and heading to his table once more.

Another injection, another cry, and another gross looking fluid inserted into my arm. I didn't know quite how long it would take to take effect, but my head had already started to get considerably heavier, and I could feel my eyelids beginning to droop. Not good. Had he given me some sort of anesthetic? No. It wouldn't have looked like that.

Deidara screamed, and my eyes snapped open. Across the room, another man with short raven black hair was standing over him, a scalpel clutched tightly in his hand. For a moment, I was stupid enough to believe that the man had yet to cut Deidara. However, not even moments later, I saw blood begin to seep through his shirt. The liquid splattered all over the floor, and I could practically see all of the color drain from his face. His expression twisted into that of pure horror, and he inhaled sharply before the man brought the scalpel down again. This time, it dug into the blonde's back, and a bone chilling scream tore from his mouth.

Without thinking, I ran forward, only to have Nova seize me by the shoulders and throw me back. "What are you doing?" I screamed, only to have both the raven haired man and Deidara stare at me.

"Looks like your roommate's got a soft spot for you. I didn't expect you'd be able to seduce him that easily," he muttered, running the blace across Deidara's cheek and then his collar bone. "I really don't feel like experimenting on you today. I have a headache, so it's kind of annoying to have to deal with your screaming." He punched the blonde in the jaw, and I grimaced as he fell to the ground.

Then…oh, I don't know…give him some sort of anesthetic, perhaps? I don't know what happened. Only hours ago, I wouldn't have cared one way or another what happened to the kid. Or at least that's what I told myself. Maybe the fact that I had never actually witnessed something such as the abuse of another human being that made me think I had so little regard for human life.

I definitely wasn't prepared for this. I looked back over at Deidara, who was slumped over and looked dead, to be perfectly honest. I tried to shout again, but Nova pulled me up and clamped his hand over my mouth. Without knowing fully what was going on, I knew I was in trouble.

The needle of yet another syringe pushed against my arm, and another fluid was inserted into my bloodstream. And the last thing I saw was the other man bringing the scalpel up over his head. His arm thrust down, and before I could see it make its mark, I slumped forward and fell unconscious.


	5. Chapter 4

When I saw Sasori fall over, another scream tore through my lips. Nova, who was as calm as ever, picked up a bunch of supplies from the table and nudged the redhead with his feet. "That worked a lot faster than I was hoping," he muttered casually. "I was hoping I'd be able to start the surgery before he went under. I suppose it can't be helped, though…"

I watched, horrified as he set down a scalpel, scissors, and some other tool that I couldn't manage to identify, and pulled Sasori onto an operation table. I knew all too well the bright lights that shone above him; waking up to see them with a killer migraine is kind of hard to forget.

"Don't get distracted, girlie." A blade dug into my forearm, and another scream slipped out. It hurt, to say the very least. Not enough to cry, but it was still horrendous. I forced myself to look up at Delsin, who already had my blood covering his hands and a large portion of his clothing. Unlike Nova, he wore a thick black jacket, but even then I could still see the blood on it.

I can't say that the whole situation surprised me; only moments before the experiment took place, I had screamed at Nova. Normally, I wouldn't have thought twice about this action. However, in doing this, I had also broken one of the most upheld rules in the laboratory; don't disrespect your superiors. _Ever_. Consequences may or may not result in death.

Oh, didn't I know it. My head was throbbing thanks to the massive amount of blood loss, and I didn't need to look down to know that the liquid had already begun to pool around me. And I thought my pants were all gross and bloody before. This was going to be fantastic when it dried. Almost every inch of the cloth was soaked in blood, which in turn effectively plastered the pants to my skin.

The feeling of nausea swept over me, and I found myself fighting the tremendous urge to gag and bring up whatever was in my stomach. And you know, I was doing a pretty good job of it until Delsin suddenly thrust his fist forward and dug it into the pit of my stomach. That kind of sucked.

Not to mention filled my mouth with the nastiest taste ever after I proceeded to throw up the contents of my stomach. I looked down, and I can honestly say that I wasn't surprised to see a good mouthful of blood now splattered all over the ground. Now, being under the impression that this probably wasn't the best thing ever, I proceeded to freak out. If I had any single rational thought cross my mind, I may have stopped.

Nah, I'm not even going to bother lying. No matter the mental state, I would have began to panic. Perhaps not on the same level as this, but it would still have been pretty awful, to say the least. I almost grabbed the scalpel out of Delsin's hand, and a screaming fit came over me when I missed it.

"You're going to give me a headache. Since I'm in no mood to deal with you today, I'll just get this over with," said man muttered, stabbing me in the hand. I gasped out, a scream following soon after. And unfortunately, I was not given the same privelege as Sasori. That is, rather than getting some sort of anesthetic, the last thing I processed was Delsin's hand connecting with my head, then my neck, and then darkness.

I blinked my eyes open what I thought was probably hours later. I expected to find myself lying face down in a pool of my own blood, left in the experimentation room. Sasori would be across from me, and I honestly didn't want to think about what shape he was going to be in. Nova wasn't exactly thrilled about the fact that Emory had already talked to him. Twice. Once to inform him of an incorrect assumption, and once to ask what was going to happen to him.

However, I found that I was in my normal dank room with the smell of blood prominent in the air around me. Disgusting. Thanks to the lack of windows in the room, there was no chance of the pungent stench getting out either.

I blinked a few more times, and while I should have known better, I attempted to pull myself up into a sitting position. Rather than being successful, it resulted in a scream as I slumped back to the ground.

Delsin had gotten a bit excited with his scalpel, so I tried to get the concept of moving out of my brain. Even a simple action such as lifting my arm caused a sharp wave of pain to shoot through me. There were cuts all over my body, and judging from how freaky Delsin was acting, it was going to be quite some time before they left. I tried to shift my legs, and while they didn't hurt nearly as much, I could feel my crusty, blood-covered pants rubbing against each other and my skin. Gross.

I shuddered and turned my head, hoping to distract myself by seeing how Sasori was doing. Still unconscious, he was sprawled out on the floor on the other side of the room. Even though the lighting was terrible as per usual, I could make out several cuts that looked as if they were poorly sewn shut with a thick black string.

I could only imagine what I looked like. If his wounds were dressed that poorly, and mine were at least ten times worse…it was probably horrific. Trying not to think about it, I focused on his injuries. He was completely still. Maybe even dead, perhaps. It was hard to tell, to be perfectly honest.

The only way I could think of to describe him would be as a doll. A cut up and poorly put back together doll. I sighed and tried to adjust position, only to fail miserably. Finally, I gave up and looked at him again just in time to see his eyelids flutter open, revealing two confused, brown eyes. Before I could warn him, the redhead attempted to move as I did. However, rather than crying out, he inhaled sharply and collapsed.

"Good, you're alive, un," I managed to say, shooting him a painfully fake smile. He smirked back and shrugged.

"I suppose." I absentmindedly ran a hand down my torso, only to feel stitches that were probably just like the ones covering Sasori's body. Running my fingers over them again and again, I tried to picture what they looked like. I must've looked mangled. Torn apart. Destroyed.

Was I going to be able to survive? Or did Delsin actually manage to hit something vital? I had thrown up a mouthful of blood…but I was still alive. I may not have been in the best shape, but I was still breathing…capable of functioning properly minus movement.

I took a deep breath. There was no need to get worked up now. They'd done far worse than this. All I had to do was think of something worse…

Sasori had been kidnapped. His parents were probably worried sick about him. He was getting torn apart. My first roommate turned blue and shark-like because of his experiments. The one after was schizophrenic. And the one before Sasori was a psychopath, and on top of that, was could no longer speak. Nova had made the same threat to him as he had to Sasori, but rather than backing down, he tried to fight. Long story short, his tongue was cut out and he was no longer capable of forming proper words.

But I was still here. I had managed to persevere, get through, and keep myself under control.

Bullshit. They just kept me around so they could poke fun at how I looked, or because of my sexuality. The scientists found it amusing to poke fun at the gay kid. Maybe harass him if they were really bored. It didn't matter what they did; they had girlfriends, so they couldn't be pinned with the same title. Queer. Faggot.

I groaned and squeezed my eyes shut. This wasn't helping me calm down. Rather, hatred began to eat away at me. Why was it always me? That was an easy question to answer. Not only was I gay, but I was considerably weaker than anyone else that had come in here. Malnutrition destroyed my body, leaving me defenseless against any of the people working in the labs.

"Deidara, what's going on?" The sound of Sasori's voice snapped me back to reality. I looked him in the eyes, only to see a look of desperation. He had absolutely no idea as to what was going on. And on top of that, I couldn't tell him. It wasn't like I had any idea of what they put into him. The only thing I saw was a brightly colored liquid, a syringe, and a needle. "My body's on fire. I feel like I'm going to die," he groaned, slowly lifting his hands up so that he could cover his face.

I can only say that I was at a complete loss. What _was_ going on? I had gotten a few injections, but nothing had really happened to me. Or…nothing noticeable, anyway. Either I was completely immune to what they were giving me, or he was super sensitive to it. "I…I don't know, un," I admitted. "I really wish I could tell you, but I have absolutely no idea, un." The redhead shot me a pained look, but what could I do?

"I don't even know why I'm here. They kidnapped me, didn't even tell me what was going on, and now…I don't even know…" he choked out.

What was I supposed to do? At best, I could ramble on and try to distract him from the pain. "Sasori, where are you from?" The question seemed to have caught him off guard, but after wincing once again, he prepared to answer me.

"Sand village, a bit north from here, I think. Or maybe south…I don't know which way I came from. Why?"

I shrugged. "No reason. What's your village like?" Once again, Sasori winced, this time clenching and unclenching his muscles in what looked like an attempt to distract or calm himself.

"Not too interesting. Most of the time it's really dry. Back where I lived I was a puppeteer…the most popular one around, in fact. I suppose I shouldn't be surprised that they targeted me, considering that it would make quite an impact if I disappeared."

The only thing that really caught my attention was puppets. "Art, un?"

For a brief moment, I could have sworn I saw a smile cross his face. "Yeah. I have dozens of them sitting around in the shop." Sitting? Did they do anything else there? Like…explode, perhaps?

"Are they used for explosions later, un? I guess you'd need a lot of them if-"

"Explosions? I don't think so. I would never blow up my art. I believe that true art is eternal-"

"Nonsense! Art's meant to be brief, un!"

"That's ridiculous," he muttered, now frowning at me. I shrugged. He was entitled to his own opinion, no matter how stupid I thought it was. I mean, the concept of _not_ blowing up art was…interesting.

"Whatever, un. I was a trouble maker in my village, so I sold myself off here so that they wouldn't have to worry about me anymore. My parents yelled at me a lot, and they started getting mad at me for making some choices that they found to be either irrational or stupid, un," I explained. Sasori rose a brow and tried to sit up once more, only to fail.

He took a deep breath before looking at me again. "Oh? Your story sounds more interesting than mine," he commented. "Care to tell me the rest of it?"

I shrugged. "Well, my family and I got to the point where we stopped speaking. I figured that since I was so different from them and such a burden, I might as well just get rid of myself and try to do something good for them, un." This was the first time I had thought about it for a while. What else was there for me to think about, though? My parents were sick of me, so I took care of the problem. There was no way we'd be able to communicate successfully.

"So you essentially sold yourself?" Sasori inquired. He looked genuinely concerned, and I couldn't help but wonder why. There was no reason for him to care about what had happened about the past.

Nodding, I continued with my story. "Pretty much. It was kind of weird at first, because I actually missed them for a while, un. But now I'm just assuming that they're better off without me here. I didn't actually tell them I was leaving. They probably wouldn't have cared-"

"You're an idiot."

"Un?" the redhead glared at me, and I couldn't help but feel uneasy. What was going on? "What, un?"

He scowled and forced himself up into a sitting position. A cry slipped from his lips, but he stayed where he was. "You've seriously got to be kidding me. They were _sick_ of you? I don't believe that."

"What are you talking about? They wanted to get rid of me, un. It-"

"Deidara, a parent doesn't hate their child." I couldn't help but laugh at this. Evidently, he had been living in some sort of fantasy world.

"I don't think so, un. Parents don't hate their children. What kind of place have you been living in, un? Evidently, you've never had parents-" Before I could finish my sentence, Sasori let out some sort of aggravated shriek.

"You're right, I've never had parents! Maybe I _am_ just making myself believe that no parent has ever gotten sick of their child, and that they never fight, and that they…they…" As soon as I saw tears begin to well up in his eyes, I knew I had accidentally struck a nerve. This wasn't good. He was…crying. Honestly, even though I had only known him for a short time, this was something that seemed almost impossible. While he had shown emotion during the time that I had spent with him, it was either rage, confusion or fear. Nothing even close to sadness even crossed him.

I couldn't say that I didn't feel bad now. I hadn't meant to hurt him, really. "Sasori, I'm sorry, un. Maybe my parents didn't hate me." Of course I was just lying now to make him feel better. "But I do know that we weren't on good terms with each other. We couldn't listen to each other, un. I felt like I had to go. Maybe it was a mistake, but what can I do about it now, un?"

I don't think I had ever told a better lie in my life.


	6. Chapter 5

There was just dust in my eyes. That was the only thing I could think of. I repeated it over and over again until even I believed that it was true. Just some dust…you know…right after Deidara had mentioned his parents.

I obscured my face from view, hoping that I could blink away the tears. "What were they like?" At first, I didn't realize that I had asked him out loud. But when I looked back to see Deidara pause and think about what he was going to say, I couldn't take it back. I had no idea as to what he was going to tell me, but it didn't take a genius to tell that it wasn't going to be pretty.

"My mom was a drinker and a gambler, un. Pretty bad combination, so we were usually pretty low on cash. A few times when I was younger, the landlord would threaten to kick us out of the apartment, un," he began, shrugging casually as if this were something normal. "Whenever Ma got drunk, she'd hit me around and stuff, un. Dad always took her side, so I was always alone. He'd hit me if I tried to fight back, and since he was stronger it kinda sucked, un. My little sister always hid in my room, and I'd take her beatings for her."

…Little sister? "Where is she now?" I couldn't help but ask. One of the saddest smiles I had ever seen tugged at his lips, and he shrugged.

"I dunno, probably dead, un. I'm lucky Ma didn't bash my head in, and since I left, she probably didn't make out all that well." He paused, clearing his throat. "It got worse when I started high school. She broke a few glasses over my head once-"

"What the hell? Why?" I asked. Evidently, I _had_ been forcing myself to believe that there weren't bad parents. Unless, of course, Deidara had went on another one of his rampages…But even then, that couldn't be used as an excuse to hurt a child.

"Ma got mad at me because I didn't have a date for prom, un. I know it sounds really stupid, but I had never brought home a girl, and my parents didn't like thinking that I could possibly be…different…I guess…" He was beginning to get uncomfortable, and it was showing. The more I stared at him, the more I realized how much of an open book he was. He'd never be able to lie to anyone. How had he managed to keep himself alive?

I rose a brow and waited for him to continue. When he said nothing, my curiosity began to push the rational part of my mind away. "Different?" It only took that one word for him to begin laughing. But this was different. It wasn't the same…he didn't sound crazed or insane. Rather, he sounded more like a hurt child, laughing only because if he didn't he would burst into tears. It seemed to be the only thing keeping him from falling apart.

"My parents weren't exactly thrilled at the concept of having a gay son, you know. Not very open minded, un." I could have sworn I saw his lip quiver. Fully prepared for waterworks, I was rather surprised when he continued with a steady voice. "Since they kept getting nastier, and we couldn't even be in the same room with each other anymore…I left, un."

While it did seem to make sense…the fact that he left his sister with them was odd, to say the least. In leaving, he was pretty much shoving her out in the open with no way to defend herself. And he seemed distraught over the fact that she may or may not have been dead…

As if he had been reading my mind, Deidara began talking again. "I sent the money to my sister, you know. I'm kind of hoping she used it to get the hell out of there. Even if she just moved into one of her friend's houses, un. It's not like they didn't know the situation." He cleared his throat again. "She probably hates me, un."

I thought I saw his lip quiver again, and I scooted closer to him. "Stop talking nonsense. You know that she of all people would know what was happening. There was a good reason for you to leave…don't you think she'd realize that?" I wrapped one of my arms around his shoulder, half expecting him to either hit me or pull away.

To say the very least, I was shocked when he leaned against me. Without acknowledging a thing I said, he continued. "I didn't even say goodbye, un…"

For a moment, I debated with myself over the best thing to say to him. And I realized after a while that it wasn't advice he wanted…it was just someone to talk to. Even if I didn't pay attention and only nodded every once in a while when the hum of his voice stopped, it was good enough.

It went on like this for a few days. As our bodies healed, Deidara would sit next to me and talk about either his sister, or something simple like what his home town was like the last time he was there. It didn't sound much more interesting than my own home; rocks, dirt, and absolutely nowhere to go in your free time.

I learned he was only nineteen. He ran away from home when he was seventeen, and had managed to stay alive for about two years in this dump of a place. And during those two years, he had the pleasure of sticking with the same two scientists, who for some reason never seemed to tire of messing with him.

He paused for just a moment, and in that one second my stomach let out the worst, most obnoxious growl I had ever heard in my life. You know, I hadn't realized that I had yet to eat since I got here. Probably not a good thing.

"They'll probably give us some food in a few hours if they remember, un," Deidara said in an attempt to comfort me. "It's usually not this bad. I think they were just pissed at us because we wouldn't listen during the last experiment, un."

I shrugged and smiled at him. "I'll be fine." But I could only imagine what I was going to start looking like. Deidara's body was completely destroyed, and even though his parents seemed completely irresponsible, he couldn't have always looked this unhealthy. With his face hollowed out, he looked almost like a skeleton. And with shadows dancing around us in the poorly lit room, the blond looked even unhealthier.

Deidara smiled back at me and rested one of his hands on top of mine…only to pull away a moment later. "Sasori, what the hell's wrong with your hands, un?" My head snapped down, fearing that something horrible had happened.

Too bad they looked exactly the same as they normally did. "Deidara, what are you talking about?" I pressed my palms together, but everything was perfectly normal. He shot me a weird look, and I could only stare at him. What was going on?

"Your hands feel like wood, un." …Wood? I touched one hand, and then switched, doing the same to the other. Nothing seemed different. I touched my arm. Nothing.

"You're just imagining things."

"No, really! They're all…smooth and stuff. Like they've been sanded, un."

"Maybe I just have smooth hands?"

"Not like that, un!" he said in an exasperated tone. Before I knew what was going on, he reached out and brushed his hand against my face, then my neck. If I hadn't been so sore from my stupid cuts, I probably would have pulled away. "It's not just your hands, un…" he trailed off.

Okay, either my roommate was seriously losing it, or there really _was_ something wrong with me. Unfortunately, I couldn't seem to convince myself that it was the latter. If my hands had suddenly gained a wood esque texture, that's something I think I would notice. Also, it seemed that he only seemed to just notice this, as the blond had developed a habit of touching my hand whenever I would put it on his shoulder to comfort him.

Something like this couldn't have happened so fast. Or…at least that's what I chose to tell myself. Besides, something like that wasn't even possible. And then I remembered something ever so slightly important.

Nova had put two unknown substances in my body. No one seemed very excited to tell me what they were…but still, they couldn't do something like this. Yeah, Deidara just didn't have his head screwed on right today. That's it.

"I'm pretty sure nothing's changed, Deidara." Rather than arguing any longer with me, he gave me one last worried look before trying to change the topic.

"So…um…" This had to be the first time in days that he was having trouble speaking. "Are you feeling okay? Your cuts don't look too bad, un…" he muttered, eyes traveling down to my stitches and then back up to my face.

I nodded. "They're fine. Are you all right?" I asked, just trying to keep the conversation going. But I couldn't say that I was just doing it to keep him talking. I hated to admit it, but the kid was really starting to grow on me.

"Un. It kinda hurts, but I've gotten worse, un," he replied with a smile. "They keep putting stuff in me, but I never die, so it's all good, I guess," Deidara continued with a shrug. "Maybe they're just trying to freak me out or something. It's kind of weird, actually." He was right, that _was_ strange. Especially since I had possibly been affected by whatever was put inside of me, and it had only been a few days.

I wrapped an arm around his shoulder, and he tensed up. "Don't worry about it." Much easier said than done, I know. However, since I couldn't think of anything else to say, it would have to do. "Even if you do end up a bit weird, I won't let you deal with it alone, okay?"

"Thanks, Sasori, un," he whispered, resting his head on my shoulder. I rustled his hair with my free hand, letting it drop to my side immediately after. "You know, I thought you were going to be a total bastard when you first came here, un." I rose a brow and smirked.

"Does this mean I'm okay?"

"Yeah, un." The blond adjusted himself so that he could put his hand on my shoulder as well.

Insane or not, I had to admit that Deidara was pretty cute.


	7. Chapter 6

My respect for Sasori had to have increased at least ten fold.

I figured that the redhead should have been informed of what he was dealing with (namely, someone with a different sexual orientation than him) so I eventually ended up telling him that yeah, I'm attracted to men.

Best part? He didn't care. In fact, he didn't even mention it. I took that to mean that it didn't even phase him. After dealing with all of the crap Nova and Delsin had bothered me with, I had expected him to get really grossed out or something, I guess.

Instead, he just listened to me for hours and hours, letting me tell him everything that had happened before I got here. It was…fantastic, actually. I honestly couldn't remember the last time I had had such an in depth conversation with someone who actually took the time to let me speak without trying to give advice.

For the first time in a while, I could say that I was genuinely happy. Yes, I was still in a place that closely resembled a death camp, and I still didn't know what was going to happen to me. But I had someone that I could trust.

It really meant a lot to me.

Eventually, towards the end of a long talk about something along the lines of our experiments I ended up with my head resting against Sasori's shoulder. His body still felt like wood, but I dropped the subject since I had no chance of convincing him. Seriously, only a little while ago, his skin was coarse and rough like someone who had went through years of physical labor.

I snuggled closer to him, and he didn't seem to mind. I carried out each move with utmost care, seeing as even a simple mistake would probably get me thrown across the room. Like…once we could actually move without a wave of pain stopping us.

The door to our room creaked open, and we were separated in less than a second. The last thing I wanted to deal with was Nova mocking me over this. Ugh.

I did regain my composure rather quickly when I saw that it was one of the new guards rushing in with a sad plate of food barely enough for a single person, never mind two starving teenagers. He placed it on the ground in front of me and practically fled from the room without looking me in the eyes. Must've heard about my "insanity" or whatever the hell they called it now. I pulled the plate over and observed it, only to find the same food that had been there almost every time since I had arrived.

A piece of bread, watery soup, and sad excuse for vegetables. Without talking a bite of the food, I pushed it towards Sasori. Without a word, he broke off a piece of a bread, and popped it into his mouth. I expected him to eat more of it, so when he shoved the plate back towards me, I was thoroughly shocked. Now, I knew that the food was pretty horrendous, but neither of us had eaten in days. "Un?"

"You need it more than I do," he said simply.

"But-"

"If you don't eat it, I'm going to force the food down your throat." That was kind in a…twisted kind of way. I opened my mouth to argue, but I didn't have a chance to say anything. Sasori's eyes narrowed and a frown tugged at his lips. "I'm not kidding."

"Yeah, but you're not used to it, un. Eating like this is pretty normal for me now." The constantly empty pit in the bottom of my stomach was almost a part of me now. Whenever food came, it only reminded me of how hungry I was, and how insatiable it was. Might as well try to keep him somewhat well fed.

The redhead sighed and picked up the rest of the bread. Once again, I thought he was going to eat it. Instead, he threw his arm forward and pressed the food against my lips. My eyes widened, and we just stared at each other, not moving and inch. "Deidara, I'll tell you again; I'm fully prepared to force feed this to you. I saw your body when we were showering, and whether you notice it or not, you're practically a skeleton." He cleared his throat before forcing my hand open and putting the bread in it. "Now eat."

Of course I knew my body was messed up. But in this place, who's wasn't? The scientists barely had enough food to hold themselves over, so it was expected that we were going to end up like this.

Even if I told Sasori this, he wouldn't have listened to me. "Fine, un," I finally said, letting out a defeated sigh before putting an almost miniscule amount of bread into my mouth. Soon, the rest of it was gone.

But just as I expected, I was once again reminded of how starving I really was. Rather than filling up, my stomach cried out. Stupid.

Half of the plate vanished in no time at all. Granted the food was horrendous and had probably expired long ago, it ended up getting me to a point of maybe holding me over for a bit longer. Surprising, actually.

Sasori sat in silence, watching me. Now, while I had expected him to be waiting, hoping to get maybe a bit of whatever food was left, I instead found him sitting there with a small smile on his face. "Do you want some, un?" I asked.

"Nah."

"We're probably not going to eat again for a while, un…" I muttered, but it didn't do any good. He insisted that he was perfectly fine, even though only moment before, his stomach had let out a huge growl.

He smiled, trying to reassure me. "I'm fine, Deidara." Liar. I said nothing more about it, and reluctantly finished the food before placing it back by the door. While I felt bad that he had nothing more than a bit of bread, I was grateful that he had let me eat everything else.

We sat in silence, and I rested my head against Sasori's shoulder. He's just much more comfortable than the floor, that's all. "I think we have a check-up soon, un," I muttered, since it seemed he had absolutely nothing to say.

"To make sure we're not dead or dying, right?" he replied, smirking. "And I take it that Nova and his friend are coming in again…"

"Delsin, un." Sasori nodded, and the silence settled back in. My eyelids began to droop, only to snap back open when I felt the redhead grab a handful of my hair. "What are you doing, un?" I rose my hand to hit him away, but he calmly grabbed my wrist and put it back on my lap.

Rather than giving me an explanation, he began twirling a few strands of my hair between his fingers. "Calm down." Was all he said to me.

You see, the problem was not that he was touching my hair, or whatever. Not at all. The problem was that if Nova walked in, I was going to get hell about this for a while. I should have told Sasori that, but…he probably wouldn't understand.

Staying on guard was just going to have to work for now. There shouldn't have been anything to worry about (yeah, right) but that didn't stop me from tensing up and preparing to pull away whenever somebody's footsteps neared the door. Each time, it was either another prisoner walking around due to their roommate being in an experiment, or a guard. Neither would really be much of a threat if they came in. Worst comes worst, if I pretended to have some sort of laughing fit, they'd get out in less than a second.

Since they think I'm crazy, I might as well use it to my advantage.

I couldn't tell whether or not Sasori noticed my discomfort, seeing as his eyes were closed and I couldn't read any sort of emotion on his face. "Sasori-" Without a chance to finish my sentence, his eyes shot open and he tore his hand away from me. "Um…What were you doing, un…?" I asked warily, now rather confused at what was going on.

It didn't help that upon closer inspection, his face looked like it was turning red. "Nothing." Yeah, right.

"Seriously? Because that certainly didn't look like 'nothing', un," I retorted, frowning. I guess he was embarrassed. I don't know if it was awful of me or not, but now that he was like this, a wave of relief swept over me. Now I didn't need to worry about Nova coming in and being an idiot.

"It was nothing, Deidara." That should have been a sign for me to drop it. I certainly hope he didn't expect me to. I scowled and went to say something, only to stop when I heard footsteps rushing down the hall. I could see someone's shadow stop right outside of our door, and I inwardly groaned.

_Please not him…_I groaned silently as the lock on the door clicked open. Much to my dismay, the door swung open and Nova came running in with that same ridiculous smile plastered on his face.

I glanced at Sasori, who looked about just as thrilled as I did. "I was bored, so I figured I'd do your check-ups now," he said simply, motioning for us to follow him. I attempted to pull myself onto my feet, pleasantly surprised when I found that I could still walk. Sasori was up only a moment later, clutching the wall for support. "You two don't look like you've fallen apart yet…close, though."

The brunette spun on his heel and walked out of the room, expecting us to follow. Since I wasn't exactly in the mood to mess around, I sighed and walked close behind him.

Back into our surgery room, I was surprised to see that there was still a few signs from our last visit; blood stained the far wall from where I had been brutally sliced open, and the floor looked like it hadn't been cleaned of the blood stains. "Go shower again, I'm gagging," Nova demanded.

Without a moment to spare, we scurried off into the other room and quickly stripped down to wash the blood off of our bodies. "This is disgusting," Sasori murmured, tracing the stitches on his body. Most of them were around his joints, making it look even more like he had been cut up and put back together.

"I know, un," I replied, letting my pants run under the freezing water. Slowly they became less stiff as the blood rinsed down the drain. It would take a while for them to dry, but it wasn't like I hadn't sat in soaking wet clothes before. I had more important things to worry about, anyway.

Once the blood had been washed off as well we could manage, we found Nova sitting on the ground, waiting for us. "I know you two were too busy looking at each other's junk, but could you try and hurry it up next time?" he grumbled,

At least a thousand ways of killing him flew through my mind, but much to my dismay I knew that none of them would work.

"What's your problem?" At the sound of Sasori's voice, both Nova and I turned to face him. I with shock, and Nova with malicious intent. I could already tell that this wasn't going to end well.

The brunette stood up and advanced towards him. "Didn't you learn from last time?"

Looking completely unfazed, Sasori stepped forward as well. "Stop avoiding my question. What's your problem?"

He was…standing up to Nova. I never thought I'd actually see it happen…I blinked a few times, hoping that it wasn't a dream. Nope. It was really happening. "I'm going to kill you," he hissed, pushing Sasori back. Without hesitation, he stepped back forward."Yeah? Go ahead," the redhead growled, shoving Nova back.

Shit, he was going to die. But what could I do? Nova looked absolutely _furious_ and I was far too useless to help the situation. If anything, I'd make it worse. "You think I'm bluffing, don't you?"

"Actually, yes. Answer me; why are you so bent on making his life a living hell?"

"Not like anyone cares-"

"I care. Answer." What?

Sasori…cared about me. But why? "Sasori, don't, un," I whispered. There was no reason for the redhead to get himself killed over me. Nova wasn't going to listen to him, and there was no way that he was going to answer.

"The kid's insane, what does it matter?" Sasori closed his eyes for a moment before opening them again. Was he…angry? Nova took a swing at his face, and the redhead didn't even move. Rather, he looked back at the scientist and smiled.

And then proceeded to grab him by the throat. "Are you kidding me?" he threw Nova back, and he stumbled before crashing to the ground. He looked genuinely shocked, to say the least. "Since when does that make it okay for you to talk shit about him?" Sasori swung blindly, just barely missing the brunette's head.

Nova was up on his feet a moment later, now holding a pocket knife in his hand. "I'll kill you," he muttered, a smile that I thought only the devil could wear spreading a cross his face.

This was going to be bad. "Sasori, stop, un!" Too late. Said redhead lunged for Nova, and the blade dug into his shoulder. "Sasori!" He screamed, and was thrown to the ground not a moment later.

The scientist pulled the blade out of my roommate and looked back at me. "You told him to do this, didn't you?" He gave Sasori a swift kick in the side, laughing when the teen groaned.

"N-no, un…" I whispered, biting down on my lip. I was shaking. There was no way I'd be able to hide it. "I…He wasn't t-thinking. Don't kill him, un," I pleaded weakly. What good was that going to do either of us? Sasori was going to be as good as dead by the time Nova was done with him. Just by the look on the scientist's face, I could tell that he was ready to kill.

Nova grabbed me by the collar of my shirt, and I very nearly screamed. "Do you think you can stop me?" My back connected with the wall, the brunette's torso holding me in place. "Tell me, faggot; do you _really_ think you'll be able to change my mind?" he shouted, seizing me by the throat. Not good.

"S-stop, un…" I gasped. And then an idea hit me. "If you don't s-stop…I'll let everyone know that you got beat by one of the prisoners, un." He laughed. "You'd leave at least one of us alive…I know you don't have many p-people left to experiment on, un."

He struck me across the face, and I knew I was right. "You little bitch!" Nova punched me again and again, and I couldn't do anything to stop him. But I was hoping even if I didn't get out of here, Sasori would. I was hoping that I could use his sadism to my advantage…he only had two other people left to work with; the mute and some other kid completely covered in stitches. Not too much for him to work with.

"You think I'm kidding, un?" I asked, saying just what he did when Sasori had confronted him earlier. He visibly twitched, and before I could process what was happening, I was on the ground with a gun pressing against my forehead.

Shit.

"Don't worry, I won't kill you…" he whispered, pulling the firearm away. His finger was against the trigger, completely prepared to fire. "I'll make sure you two stay alive. I'm not quite done with you yet." I barely even heard him speak. My eyes were locked on the fire arm, and each time it moved, so did my eyes. "See? You're not going to die."

Instead, he pointed it at Sasori and fired. "No, un!" Another gunshot. Another. Another. Sasori cried out, his body jerking each time it was hit. "STOP!" Blood began to pool around him, and I screamed. No, no, no, this couldn't be happening. He just said that he wasn't going to kill him. Another scream. Blood began dripping from his nose and mouth. No.

I tried to pull myself up, but Nova tackled me back to the ground, pointing the gun against my head. I didn't care anymore. I began thrashing violently, and rather than shoot me, he hit me with the butt of the gun. "Deidara," he murmured, adjusting himself so that his face was only inches from mine. I couldn't focus. My breaths came out in short, quick gasps, and he hit me again. "You better hope that I didn't accidentally hit anything vital…" I cleared my throat in an attempt to calm myself, and the gun ended up under my chin. One shot, and I was gone. "When you two get back to your room, make sure Sasori knows _never_ to do this again. Understand?" I nodded quickly, now perfectly still. Even if I wanted to respond verbally, I couldn't form the words.

He brushed a strand of hair out of my face, and I shuddered. I wanted his disgusting hands off of me. Hands that could have very well killed the first roommate that I cared about. I was too stunned to cry. "Now, let's make a deal," he began, smiling at me again. I wanted to punch that stupid look off of his face. "If you don't tell anyone about this, I'll make sure nobody finds out about how you were dying to kiss me during your check-up today. Got it?" I couldn't help but raise a brow. _What_?

Before I could question it further, Nova shifted and crashed his lips against mine.


	8. Chapter 7

"…sori? Sasori, un!" When the gunshots went off, and pain immediately began coursing through my body, I was pretty sure I had died. As I slipped into unconsciousness, I was almost positive that it was all over, and my life was slipping away. When I heard Deidara's voice, I wasn't comforted in the least.

Nova shot him, too. "Sasori, please wake up, un!"

…Wake up? I tried to open my eyes, and I found myself back in our cell. What was going on? I was almost positive that my life had ended. But here I was, laying on the ground with Deidara kneeling over me, a worried look on his face. I blinked a few times, and I saw relief flood over him. "…Deidara, what's going on?" I tried to sit up, and he immediately assisted me so that I could lean against the wall.

"Nova shot you, un." Well duh, I knew that much. I suppose I should have been a bit more specific. Deidara stared at me, and…was that awe in his expression? "I can't believe you're still alive, un. I thought he got you in the heart…"

Yeah, neither could I.

I grabbed a few locks of his matted blond hair and tucked them behind his ear, sighing heavily. "Are you all right, Deidara?" I inquired, moving my hand so that it could rest on his shoulder. For a moment, he stared at me blankly, and I said nothing.

"You're kidding, un," he said, frowning at me. "You've seriously got to be kidding me."

I rose a brow. "Dei-"

"Am _I_ all right? Nova shot you at least _four times_! And you're asking _me_ if I'm all right, un?" He let out an aggravated shriek before pushing me back. What was going on? "You're an idiot, un!"

"Deidara, shush…" I said in an exasperated tone, seizing him by the arms. He immediately began squirming and trying to pull himself away, but didn't have the strength to do so. "Dei!" As soon as I rose my voice, he froze where he was. And at the same time, I did, too. Dei? Where the heck did that come from? Whatever. At this point, I just had to go with it.

The blond stared at me with wide eyes, waiting for me to continue. "Dei, I was worried. The last thing I saw before I passed out was Nova holding a gun to your head. How do you expect me not to ask if you're all right?"

Unfortunately, he made no attempt to acknowledge anything I had just said. "Why, un?"

"Why what?" I asked stupidly. He scowled. Great, what did I do to upset him this time?

Deidara closed his eyes, opened them, and then turned away from me. Frowning, I moved to turn him back around, but my hand was slapped away before it even got to him. "Why did you stand up to him, un?" My mouth very nearly dropped when I heard this.

He really didn't get it? I stood up and limped over to him so that he would have to face me. "I care about you, y'know," I began, looking him straight in the eyes. He looked away…anywhere but at my face. "It was stupid. I shouldn't have said anything, but he was just pissing me off, to be quite frank." I waited for him to acknowledge what I was saying. Nothing. I sighed before continuing. "You don't deserve to be treated that way, Deidara."

I prepared myself for a number of things after I said that. Getting slapped in the face, however, was not one of them. When I saw Deidara raise his hand, I didn't know what was going to happen, and he moved so quickly that I didn't know what he was doing until he had already struck me across the face. My head snapped to the side from the force of the blow, and I immediately cupped my stinging cheek with my hand.

"Why are you doing this to me?" he screamed, lifting his hand to strike me again. This time, I caught him by the wrist without giving him a chance to swing at me. "Stop it! I hate you, un!" The blond tore his arm away from me, and I made no attempt to grab it again.

I knew he didn't mean that. Because if he really did hate me, I probably would have been either dead or out of this room by now. Instead of trying to stop him, I let him scream at me, shouting whatever he wanted until he was sitting in front of me with tears welling up in his eyes. "Done?" He nodded once before reaching forward and grabbing my hand. "What's wrong, Dei?"

Said blond began chewing on his lip. He cleared his throat, but said nothing. Cleared his throat again, and sighed. "Why do you care so much, un?" I really wish I could say that the question took me by surprise. When I looked up at his hollowed out face, all I could see was an abused child without anyone to turn to. How could I just go on and let him get hurt?

"Because you have no one else to look to for help. Let's face it; no one else really cares about what happens to you here."

"Then why are you acting different, un?" he shot back. What was his problem? Apparently, it was far too hard for him to believe that I was on his side. Unfortunately, the concept of someone not wanting to stab him in the back was unordinary.

But what was I supposed to say now? I had never really thought about _why_ I wanted to be different from everyone else. It never really seemed important. "Because…erm…" I began, totally unprepared to answer him. I sighed. "I don't know what you want me to tell you, Dei. Really, I wish I could give you an answer, but I don't know."

Deidara blinked furiously to get rid of the tears in his eyes. "It doesn't make sense, un. Something reckless like what you did earlier requires some thought beforehand. Do you know how much crap Nova's going to give you now, un?" What was this kid thinking?

I shrugged. "The only other thing I've seen him do is make stupid comments. I don't really care." Deidara's eyes flickered towards me for a second before darting away. "What?" Rather than answer me, he tried to subtly hide his face with his hair. "Did anything happen after I got knocked out?"

"No, un!" …Right.

I brushed the hair out of his face, and he almost immediately jerked away. "You're lying."

"It's none of your business, un!"

"Okay, whatever." If I could play this right, hopefully I'd get him to tell me. "I guess-"

"Fine, un…" That was a lot faster than I expected. Without saying another word, I waited for him to continue. One minute passed…then another…five minutes…This was getting ridiculous. I was about to say something, but finally, he looked back at me, a fresh batch of tears now flooding into his eyes. "I didn't want Nova to kill you…so I threatened to tell everyone about how you had been able to beat him up, un. So to make sure I didn't tell, he…well…" Deidara trailed off, biting his lip rather than finishing his sentence.

"Dei?"

What Deidara said next was so quiet that I had to strain to hear him, even though he was right in front of me. "He kissed me, un," the blond choked out before the tears spilled over. Had this happened to anyone else, I would have thought they were just being overdramatic. I wouldn't have acted so sympathetic, and I certainly wouldn't have wiped the tears from their face before telling them that everything was going to be fine. "I wanted my first kiss to be special, un…Now I'm just a stupid, gross-"

I couldn't let him finish that sentence. Without a moment of hesitation, I moved forward and threw my arms around him. It must have completely shattered his composure, since not even a minute later, his face was buried in my shoulder with sobs shaking his body every so often. "Dei, you're not stupid or gross, okay?" The sobs only got worse, and in an attempt to calm him down, I began to rub his back in a circular motion. "It's okay…really, it's okay…"

Eventually, his sobs dissipated into sniffles, but he didn't move his head from my shoulder. I could feel tears soak the fabric of my shirt, but I didn't even think of moving him. Dei, as I was now going to call him, wrapped his arms around my upper torso, pressing himself firmly against me. Whatever made him feel better, I guess.

"It's not going to be okay, but thanks, un," he whispered to me, twisting my shirt in between his fingers. "I feel disgusting…"

I frowned and placed one of my hands on the top of his head. "You're not disgusting," I said. Even I thought that it was a pathetic attempt to make him feel better, so I could only imagine what he thought of it. "Dei, don't let this get to you, all right?"

No response. I rolled my eyes and ruffled his hair. I would have ran my hands through it, but the knots kept me from doing so. "If anything, don't you think that Nova wants you to react like this?" I murmured, pulling him even closer to me. The brunette wasn't stupid. A bastard, yes, but not stupid. "If he didn't think you'd react like this, he probably wouldn't have kissed you."

"I…guess, un," he muttered. "Yeah, un." He looked up at me, a small smile gracing his face. I smiled back, and he buried his head back in my shoulder.

We sat in silence, and as his breathing began to slow, I tilted his head up to get a good look at his face. I was kind of confused when he didn't bother to even question my action. That is, until I realized that he was fast asleep. His lips were parted ever so slightly, and a few strands of hair were covering the left side of his face. He looked so much more peaceful than he did when he was awake.

Without really thinking about it, I ran one of my fingers around his cheeks, drawing invisible circles on his skin. Next, my hand moved down and let my thumb glide over his chapped lips. I should have moved my hand away, but I couldn't bring myself to do it. Instead, I put his head back on my shoulder and pulled him against me. "I'll protect you, Dei."


	9. Chapter 8

…I couldn't believe that I fell asleep on Sasori. It was just…he was so comfortable, everything was so quiet, and I was exhausted. Of course I was going to fall asleep! When I woke up, tried to act as if nothing had happened, and thankfully, Sasori played along with me.

Instead, the redhead had a new thing where he would grab hold of my hand whenever I began to talk. At first, I thought he was trying to silence me, but whenever I stopped, he would wait for me to continue. In a strange sort of way, it was kind of sweet.

No, forget that. I could never think of Sasori as…cute. Nice, maybe. But even with his wooden hands, I could still feel my heart flutter and-

Oh for the love of all that's holy, what am I, a sixteen year old girl? Sheesh.

Now, where did I leave off? Oh, right. I found myself getting used to his kindness, which I soon realized would probably harm me. Now hating everyone around me, I had become accustomed to expecting the worst. Now, however, I would find myself thinking that maybe, just maybe, things would be different. How had he managed to do this to me?

It was somewhat depressing, actually. Was I damaged to the point where anyone who showed me even the least bit of kindness would change me?

I needed to stop this.

But Sasori was so kind, and he always listened to me…Oh great, here I go again. _Snap out of it, moron,_ I'd tell myself, but did I listen? Of course not.

I was alone, though. And with no one else to talk to, I couldn't help but think about it. Delsin had come in, telling me that it had been a week since Sasori's check-up, and dragged him out. He brushed his raven black hair out of his face and told us that there was nothing to worry about. They just found something new that they wanted to test.

Really, Nova was still pissed about what had happened. The brunette had been harassing him, our food had lessened considerably, and Sasori was looking more exhausted with each passing day. I couldn't help but believe he had completely stopped sleeping. Dark circles were beginning to form under his eyes, and whenever I saw him, he was always either staring at me or the wall.

The worst part was that it was all my fault, and he never once complained about it. If I had stood up for myself, then he wouldn't have had to fight my battles for me. But how was I supposed to know he would stand up for me? There wasn't even a warning…

I exhaled quietly and rested my hand against the wall, not bothering to move it as I walked. I now stood in the empty hallway, a good thirty feet from my room. Since Sasori had been taken in for another experiment, Delsin pretty much told me to "get out and find someone else to bother" but there was no one else that would talk to me. I knew I wasn't the only one out. Just the only one being avoided. I had roomed with almost all of the people in my section of the laboratory, which didn't exactly help me build many friendships.

"Deidara? Woah, this is the first time I've seen you in forever!" At the sound of a woman's voice, I stopped and spun around.

A girl in her mid twenties came running towards me with a wide grin on her face. "Konan, un?" One of the few people I hadn't roomed with. Her long blue hair was tied up in a messy bun and had a tattered origami flower clipped at the base of it. She wore a thick t-shirt that had several holes around the bottom, and a pair of baggy sweatpants. "How've you been, un?" I asked quietly.

She looked me up and down, her lips pursed. "If I were to guess, a heck of a lot better than you," she replied. Yeah, I kind of figured. "You like the living dead, Deidara. What've they got you doing now?"

I shrugged and smiled at her. "Sasori's been giving Nova hell, un," I said. Even though I had managed to get that out, I really didn't know what to say to her. If I just said the conventional "yeah, everything's been fine" she'd interrogate me like there's no tomorrow.

Konan laughed and clapped her hands together. "That's fantastic! Although I'm surprised that you two're still breathing." Yeah, me too. Nova was just about ready to snap Sasori's neck. The only think keeping him from doing it was probably me. I'd get "boring" again if anything happened to the redhead. "Tell me, what's the new roommate like? Better than Hidan, I hope?"

I paused for a moment before shrugging. "He's nice, I guess. Not very good at starting conversations, but he listens to me. Or at least I think he does, un," I mumbled. There were millions of things I could say about him, like he could always make me smile, and he stood up for me. "He's my best friend, un," I added.

She nodded as I spoke, listening intently. Konan always liked to hear about what was going on. Every time I saw her, she was poking her nose into other people's business. But around here, what else was there to do? It was either talk to people or go and mope around. She began to say something, only to be cut off by a sharp whistle. I slapped my hands over my ears, hoping that it would make the noise go away.

"Yo! Get your ass back in your cell, blondie!" all I could manage was a quick goodbye beefier I ran back to my room, just in time to see Sasori collapse to the ground, clutching his side.

The door slammed shut behind me, and it took a minute to get used to the lighting before I could approach Sasori.

"What happened, un?" was the first thing that came out of my mouth. But rather than answer me, Sasori inhaled sharply and pulled himself into the fetal position. He looked so hurt. It was almost hard for me to watch. "Sasori…?" Nothing. He turned his head in the other direction. Not much different from me, when it came down to it.

Except unlike me, he absolutely refused to say anything after that. It felt like hours passed, but he still stayed in the same position, refusing to utter so much as a single word to me. I decided not to talk, afraid that I might come off as insensitive. He let me sit next to him, which I figured was a good sign.

It had taken until the guard slipped some food in for him to finally crack. Almost a day and a half, I think. "Sasori, you should probably eat something, un," I murmured, handing a bowl of soup to him. Said redhead glanced at me warily before taking it and muttering a quiet thank you. "You look pale, un."

"Wood doesn't get pale." The answer completely threw me off guard. I automatically assumed that he was just talking about what I said about his hands a while back. Although I was still aware of his skin now having a wood-like texture, I had completely forgot about saying anything to him.

Great, now I felt bad. "Hey, I was probably just-"

"It wasn't just you, Dei," he interrupted. "Just…forget about it. Go to sleep or something, it's late." Or, you know…around noon. But that's cool, too. Sasori quickly finished the bowl of soup before lying on the ground, presumably to go to sleep. Because if I didn't feel like a jerk before…

Within fifteen minutes, he was fast asleep. I threw myself down next to him, and immediately spotted something out of the norm. His baggy t-shirt was hanging rather low, exposing part of his shoulder and just below his collar bone. In both spots, fresh stitches were sewn into his skin, holding him together.

I like to think that what I did next was something completely normal, and that any other person would have done the same thing. People get curious, right? So it wasn't weird that I began to lift up his shirt.

…Right?

Well, completely abnormal or not, I pushed up the bottom of his shirt, and almost immediately, I froze. I got the shirt up only a few inches, and before me was one of the weirdest things I had ever seen in my life. Rather than Sasori's stomach looking like, well…a stomach, the entire cavity under his ribs had been carved out. In the place of flesh, blood, and organs was a large metal cord that had been coiled up and secured into the empty hole. My eyes had to have widened to the size of dinner plates.

How was he even alive? I placed my hand on the left side of his chest, and as soon as I did so, I could hear a steady heartbeat. "How, un…" I murmured as loudly as I dared. Sasori didn't move in the least, so I assumed that it meant I was safe. I let his shirt fall back into its original position, and I moved to get off of him.

"You're a sneaky bastard, you know." A pair of hands latched onto my wrists, and a yelp slipped from my lips. I was pulled forward, landing on top of Sasori's mutilated body. "Did you really think that pulling up my shirt was a good idea?" I looked down to find him staring at me with nothing more than an amused expression.

"I…um…uh…" I muttered, unable to form proper sentences. His grip tightened on my joints, and when I cried out, he only rose a brow.

"Well?" My mind raced for an answer, but I had none. This wasn't very good. _Come on, think…_ but still, nothing came out. "Deidara, answer me."

"Let go, un," I demanded. Pulling my arms back, I was surprised when he actually released me. I rolled off of him, and he simply watched me, the expression stuck on his face. I could have hit him. I don't know why, but I could have just smacked him in the face over and over again. Such a thought shouldn't have been running through my head, since he had just been brutally cut open and…transformed, to say the very least.

"Dei, I'm not in the mood to play games with you," Sasori growled, twisting the fabric of his shirt as he waited for me. He clenched and unclenched his hands, clearly showing his frustration. And now I felt even worse.

I shouldn't have done that. What, exactly, was I thinking? Not much, apparently. "I didn't really think about it, un," I admitted, smiling sheepishly at him. He gave me a flat look, and I sighed. "I know it was stupid, un."

I could have killed myself. Seriously, what irrational thought had come over me? In those two minutes, I could have very well destroyed our entire friendship. It was pretty obvious that he didn't want me to know, too, especially since he refused to bring it up. _You're an idiot, Deidara,_ I growled silently.

"Whatever, Dei."


	10. Chapter 9

Ten days, and Dei still hadn't spoken to me. Granted I hadn't started a conversation with the kid at all during this time, he didn't even make an attempt to talk to me. I already knew that it was due to me snapping at him when I got back from my experiment. Not too hard to figure out, really.

But what was I supposed to do? Waking up to find the blond on top of me with my shirt halfway up my torso wasn't exactly something I had been thrilled about, especially in my drugged up, half awake state. And on top of this, I was almost positive that I made it clear that I didn't want to talk about it. Granted I hadn't explicitly said it, was there any other way I could imply it?

Unfortunately, that didn't stop him from moping around whenever he wasn't in for an experiment or a check-up. He tried to stop eating, and had I not been there to force him into consuming anything, he probably would have ended up killing himself. Idiot.

"Dei, how long are you going to keep this up?" I whispered, kneeling next to the younger boy. He looked up at me before burying his head back in his knees. This was going to take a bit more work than I had expected. I was so used to him just giving up and talking to me whenever something was wrong.

At this point, I was back to square one. Actually no, it was even worse. When I had first met him, Dei was insane, but he didn't ignore me. He was obnoxious, but at least he kept me company. It was weird to say but…I really missed the old him. Sure, the blond had only been acting strange for a few days, but it seemed like forever. "Dei, please listen to me." I had apologized at least a dozen times. Nothing. "Dei-"

The blond looked up at me, and I immediately shut my mouth. I couldn't even tell the emotion on his face, and all I could do was hope that he was going to talk to me. "Nova and Delsin called me in for an experiment today, un. I'm going to meet them in the room so that I don't have to waste any of their time." Without a trace of emotion on his face, he stood up and headed towards the door. At first, I thought he was kidding. "I'll be back in a few hours, un." Dei opened the door, and the guard outside immediately let him out and shut the door, leaving me in complete silence.

This was the first time I had been alone in this place. It was so…quiet. At least before I had Dei's company, even though it wasn't much as of late. While I was busy wallowing in self pity, I failed to notice the door open again. "You can come out, you know." I couldn't recognize the voice, and it scared the hell out of me. I was on my feet in less then a second, only to begin cursing myself for such a sudden movement. My stomach was throbbing, but when I went to grab at it, all I could feel was that stupid metal cord. A girl around my own age poked her head in through the doorway, and from the looks of it, she seemed to be harmless.

"Who are you?" I inquired, only to have her smile and push the door open a tad bit more.

"My name's Konan. You're Sasori, right?" It was only natural for me to wonder how the heck she new my name, and how very easily she found my room. Granted there didn't seem to be many places to go around here, there were other people she could have gone to visit, right?

"How did you-" Before I could even finish my sentence, she began talking. I tried to shoo her out, but it ended with her running in and practically dragging me out of the room, chatting my ear off.

As soon as the garish light hit my eyes, I winced and held a hand up to my face in an attempt to make them go away. No luck, unfortunately. Konan failed to notice, and kept on talking.

Oh, what a nice kid she heard I was, and how interesting it was that I was still rooming with Deidara. He had said a lot about me. All nice things. Blah, he said that I was a really good listener, blah, blah.

I tried to ignore her, but I couldn't for the life of me get the sound of her voice out of my head. It was annoying. Not _her_, but the fact that she knew so much about me, and I had never seen this girl once in my life. At least it was only good things she knew.

That's what bothered me the most. Dei said this, and Dei said that, but it was all before I had snapped at him. Now, he acted as if he hated me, and hadn't left that same blasted spot in our room for more than a week. The blond ate a few times, but only if I began to nag at him. I'd get countless dirty looks, but it was better than him starving to death.

"I haven't heard many good things about Deidara, unfortunately."

_Of course you didn't, sweetheart. The kid's insane, and no one else can put up with him like I can_, I thought bitterly, trying my best to suppress a scowl. "I figured," I said instead, shrugging like it barely affected me.

"What do you think of him?" She must have asked Dei the same question. Otherwise, she wouldn't have known this much about me. But since when did he look up to me like that? And she mentioned some nonsense about me being his best friend.

Well, it certainly didn't seem like it now, that was for sure.

I calmly stopped in the middle of the hallway, and slowly turned to face her. Whatever I said now was going to count. The next time I was called in, she may very well talk to Dei. And since he wouldn't listen to me, it very well may have been my only chance to get him to know that I…

I don't know. An empty feeling sat in the pit of my stomach. What was I supposed to tell her when I couldn't feel a thing? "I…I…" She waited patiently, smiling at me with her bright blue lips. Where ever did she get the make up? Trying to distract myself, I looked at her eyeshadow, and then the lone piercing on her chin. It didn't work. "I…"

And all of a sudden, it all hit me; loneliness, panic, fear. "I need to go!" I screamed, catching her completely off guard. Without giving her a chance to say another word to me, I bolted back the way we had came, running by guards and whoever else was out in the halls. The flashed by me, nothing more than blurs.

I don't know why it happened, the want…no the _need_ to see Dei completely overcame me. I practically flew in the direction of our experimentation room. Skidding to a stop just outside, panic completely took over when I found that he wasn't in there.

Where had they taken him? Without any sort of rational thought, I began running to each door, looking inside or banging on the door to see if the blond was there. There was either no response, or the sound of someone cursing at me. This wasn't going to do me any good.

Only seconds later, I was back outside of our door, looking for the same people who I had passed only moments ago. With sweat now beginning to appear on my body and the lack of ability to perform proper sentences, most of them were terrified when I approached them. Most of them ran. I begged for any sort of information about Dei. They gave me strange looks, but eventually, I got the information I wanted.

He was in one of the last rooms, they told me. Hard to miss. Practically falling apart and in terrible condition. Why did it matter, they asked me, but I had no time to give them a proper response.

Just as they had said, the rooms I ended up finding were in horrendous condition. One was locked, and the other two were open. Just by looking at the doorframe, I could tell that the inside wasn't going to be all that fantastic.

Since I had never been experimented on with an open door, I chose the one closed door to lean against and try to catch my breath.

I didn't understand why I suddenly needed to be here. It didn't make sense. What good was this going to do? All I was going to be able to do was listen to him scream and get beaten. Due to the both of our health conditions, I couldn't afford to interfere. If they were given an excuse, neither Delsin nor Nova would hesitate to kill me. I'd get struck down before I took two steps into the room.

"Looks like you've gone mad, too." I glanced up to see a blue skinned man standing across the hall. He looked extremely shark-like, and even his mannerisms pointed to those of said animal. Bloodthirsty and ready to strike at any moment. "Everyone thinks Deidara finally got to you. Pretty impressed that you lasted this long, though. No one could put up with him for a week, never mind two or three months."

Of course they couldn't put up with him. Dei was too weird for everyone here. Most of the prisoners had managed to keep a rather strong hold on their sanity.

He on the other hand, couldn't handle it. I knew this all too well after witnessing dozens of his sudden panic attacks, or hysterical outbursts.

"I won't lose my head that easily," I murmured, only to have him smirk at me. Already, my patience was beginning to waver. Why did it matter? I wanted him to leave. He needed to let me focus on Dei.

"I'm sure. But careful, he's a lot more dangerous than you think." Thankfully, I didn't have to say anything else before he shrugged and left. "You're too boring. Don't worry, though; everyone wants to see how long it's going to be before you snap."

Sighing, I shut my eyes. Dei…dangerous? The thought alone was enough to make me laugh. He was moody, and sometimes acted like a sixteen year old girl, but dangerous? He definitely wasn't-

"Let go of me, un!" At the sound of Dei's scream I whipped back around and looked into the room. The poor boy was on the ground with his arms pinned behind his back. "Stop…" he whispered, trying-and failing-to pull his arms free.

I frowned. This was typical of them; beating up Dei since he was the only one that was considerably smaller than them around. Often, he would return from experiments with his torso decorated with cuts and bruises. But never had I seen him act so weak and helpless…

It was actually painful to watch. He just looked so pathetic and…small. Really, that's the only way I think I can describe it. He was falling apart right before my eyes.

"What's the matter, faggot?" Nova spat, giving him a swift kick in the ribs. Dei whimpered, and I grimaced. I didn't have a chance to properly process what had just happened before Delsin grabbed a handful of his blond hair and pulled him onto his knees. "Is being in the same room as two guys too much for you?" Nova kicked him again, and I gritted my teeth.

Several lovely thoughts pertaining to more than a few methods of torture ran through my head. I couldn't understand it at first. What was this feeling? Why? _He doesn't mean anything to you,_ I tried to tell myself, frowning as the scientists continued to send down a series of blows onto Dei's frail body. _He's mad at you, so you're mad at him. Got it?_

No, I didn't get it.

I cared about Dei. That was why I ran over here and sat outside of the door. That's why I had to follow him even though he probably hated me. And that's why I was furious about being unable to help him now.

But why did it take him getting hurt like this for me to accept it?

The sound of bone cracking brought me back to what was going on. I looked just in time to see Dei collapse to the ground and groan, clutching his side. If he was lucky, only one of his ribs would be broken. "You're just eager to get back and fuck that redhead of yours, aren't you?" Delsin taunted, snapping Dei's head back and forth as he spoke. Had the door not been locked, and had doing so not put my roommate's life in danger, I would have killed him. Snapped his neck and tore him apart. "Well, I'm sure this'll satisfy you until you get back." Dei's one visible eye widened, showing that he had absolutely no idea as to what was going on. Delsin smirked and, without so much as a moment of hesitation, pulled him forward and began to grind his crotch against the blond's mouth.

Words couldn't properly describe how utterly _enraged_ I was.

A muffled scream tore from Dei's throat, and he began thrashing around in a violent attempt to pull himself free. He was on the border of going into hysterics. He punched Delsin in the leg, but it did little good. Instead, the scientist began laughing and pushing himself harder against the blond's face. Nova stood back, seeming amused by the whole situation.

At several points in my life, I found myself furious at people I didn't even know. More specifically, the people who had brutally murdered my parents. However even then, that could not amount to how _disgusted_ this made me feel.

And when Delsin dropped Dei to the ground, I thought I would be able to compose myself. That is, until he turned his face towards the door.

At first, the younger boy looked completely emotionless. Only a second later, however, his face contorted into a pained expression, and tears began rushing down his cheeks. I didn't know if he could see me peeking in through the door, but it was like he was looking straight into my eyes.

There have been very few cases where I decided this quickly that I was going to kill someone. This didn't need any sort of rational thought, I just needed to figure out how I was going to do it.

As soon as the first tear fell from his eyes, that was it. Yes, Dei was more emotional than I, and yes, I had seen him shed tears before. But up until this point, it didn't mean much. Sure, someone picked on him a bit too much, maybe stole his first kiss, or whatever.

"_What's the matter, faggot? Is being in the same room as two guys to much for you?_" I clenched and unclenched my fists, but it did me little good. Dei stayed sprawled on the floor, and when he turned away, I didn't need to see his face to know how terrified he was. With Dei's body shaking so violently, it usually meant only one of two things; either he was going into hysterics again, or he was genuinely afraid. Unfortunately, the longer I looked at him, the more I confirmed that it was the latter.

Nova and Delsin grabbed him by the arms and pulled him onto his feet. Blood was dripping down his arms, and he winced as they began to drag him across the floor.

Clench, unclench. I should have ran, and just tried to forget all about it. They wouldn't do anything if they saw me sitting outside of the experimentation room. Maybe give me a weird look, or worst case make some sort of snide remark, since most roommates went in separate directions as soon as they were allowed out of their cells.

But it wasn't them I was worried about, it was _me_. I knew myself well enough to know that if they didn't get their hands off of Dei before they left the room, I was going to do it for them. Clench, unclench. I dug my fingernails into my palms. Turned my head away. Anything to try and stop myself from doing the inevitable.

_They'll kill you if you do anything,_ I tried to tell myself. But no, that wasn't enough. My mind easily reasoned that they wouldn't kill me. They told me that I was actually a valuable piece of information, no matter how much trouble I caused. _What if they hurt Dei again?_ _Aren't you smarter than that?_ _Think about what you're doing._ I stopped for a moment, seriously giving it a thought.

No, I wasn't smart enough to stop myself.

Upon this realization, I tried even harder to get myself to run, but my body wouldn't listen. Instead, it told me to stay where I was and watch every single moment of this.. "We'll take you back to your cell so you can screw around with Sasori some more," Nova began. At the sound of my name, I looked back just in time to see Delsin heading for the door with Dei still in his grip. Not good. "I'm sure he wouldn't mind if you-"

As soon as he stepped out of the room, I clenched my hand into a fist and punched him square in the face.

Dei fell to the ground, and with his face covered in tears, he looked completely shocked. "No, un!" he screamed, and at first, I didn't understand. With Delsin on the ground in front of me, I didn't think I had much to worry about.

Until I turned just in time to see Nova swing a metal bar at my head.

"You never learn, do you?" I blinked my eyes open, and was immediately greeted by one of the best headaches I've ever had in my life. Borderline migraine material, I think. And to add to my batch of joys, I found myself chained by my arms and legs to a chair.

Delsin was sitting in front of me, holding a rag to his nose. I could see that his face was beginning to swell, and I couldn't help but laugh ever so silently at him. The poor excuse for a human being deserved it. "How many times have I been over these rules with you? Don't. Interrupt. My. Experiments."

"Where's Deidara?"

He smirked and brushed his black hair out of his face. "Don't worry about it," he said calmly. Don't worry about it? How the hell was I supposed to do that? "No wonder you're always getting into trouble. Can't you even try to pretend that you're listening?"

"That was sexual harassment, not experimentation," I replied flatly. I'm pretty sure I visibly twitched when he began to laugh. The bastard sounded just like a hyena. It was almost frightening, really.

Delsin stood up and shrugged. "I guess you're wondering whether or not Blondie, is okay, right?" No, I _definitely_ didn't show any sort of concern only moments ago. This was a waste of my time. I needed to get to Dei, and I needed to do it soon.

And in that one moment of desperation, I remembered something. Something so freaking obvious that I still can't believe I didn't think of before. I was armed. That blasted contraption they had replaced my middle with was pointed. And not only that, but it could extend across the room and pierce Delsin and I wouldn't have to do so much as get up out of my seat.

But would it kill him? While I desired nothing more than to end his life…I didn't want to jeopardize Dei anymore than I had already. I would be lucky if he was still breathing by the time I got back-if I got back-to our room.

"Why do you insist on making him miserable?" I asked quietly, hoping that I would actually get some sort of legitimate answer.

"Why do you insist on making him happy?" No, of course not. Why did I even begin to expect him to take me seriously? "No one likes the kid except for you, and maybe that blue haired bitch. But even she's not crazy enough to take us on in a foolish attempt to protect him," Delsin stated, smirking at me as he spoke.

I stared at him, struggling to keep any emotion from sneaking onto my face. I didn't want him to be able to read me. Fearing that my motives would become obvious, I tried to make myself look as if I simply didn't care, even though I felt quite the opposite. "Why is it only him?"

"Because he's gay." I couldn't take it anymore. I screamed, and screamed, and Delsin slapped his hands over his ears in a pathetic attempt to block out the noise. Tugging at the chains, I was pleasantly surprised when I heard them squeal and then shatter, sending pieces of broken metal in every direction.

"I'll tear you apart!" An indescribable wave of energy swept through me. Adrenaline, I guess. But whatever happened, the cord shot from my midsection and tore through my shirt. Delsin's eyes widened, and he moved his hands from his ears and slammed them over his chest in one last desperate attempt to protect himself.

Useless. The pointed blade tore through his hands, digging itself deep into his chest and tearing through whatever pectoral muscles he had. A strangled scream erupted from his body, and it began jerking in random directions with no sort of predictable movement.

I wish I could say it scared me, and that I regretted doing it. Rather, the whole thing gave me a rush. I suppose that doesn't make me any better than him, does it?

I tried not to give it too much thought, and I threw Delsin's now limp body to the ground. With the blood still fresh on my weapon, I allowed it to curl back up into my stomach, and I fled from the room. Already, people were beginning to gather and stare. I pushed past them, and it thankfully, none seemed to notice the blood. Too distracted by my odd appearance, if I were to guess. A few tried to grab at me, but were far too slow or weak to actually get a hold of me.

I needed to get back to Dei. Whether he was back in our room or in that other experimentation lab, I needed to find him.


	11. Chapter 10

I thought I'd be able to hide it from him. Delsin threw me to the ground, and as tears leaked from my eyes, I couldn't help but think of how I was going to have to keep Sasori from finding out. Granted I thought he hated my guts, and I hadn't spoken to him for over a week, I still couldn't afford to let him find out. Whether he hated me or not, I knew the redhead well enough to know that he'd be furious.

But as I lay there, tears falling faster each second, I realized that I wouldn't be able to. I was scared. Sasori could read me like an open book, and the moment I was thrown back into our room, he'd know that there was something wrong. And he'd ask me what had happened. And since I was so damn stupid, I'd tell him how disgusting I felt, and none of this was fair and…how I was afraid.

This was destroying me.

My tears were soon followed by sobs, and as if he didn't even hear me, Delsin began forcing me towards the door. I knew very well that I wouldn't be able to pull myself together by the time I got back.

Why was I so weak? I couldn't defend myself, and because of that, Delsin and Nova were able to push me around so easily. I felt…dirty, really. When Nova kissed me, I had felt pretty awful, but this took the cake. My mouth was crawling with some sort of germy sensation, and I scraped at my lips with my teeth in an attempt to get it away. No good.

Delsin threw the door open, and began talking more nonsense about how he would bring me back so that I could go "screw with Sasori some more." He continued on, and I tried to ignore him. Dirty. I was disgusting. The last thing I wanted was for him to make Sasori sound that bad as well.

That is, until a blur jumped up and slammed him right in the face. I collapsed to the ground, unable to hold myself steady. Confused, I looked up only to see Sasori standing above me, staring at me with an expression I couldn't figure out. Concerned? Nothing even remotely close to that. No, no, it was something else…but I didn't have much time to think about it.

I saw Nova step behind Sasori with a metal bar in his hand. There was no time for me to do anything expect for shout and hope for him to notice. Too late. The scream got out, and not even a moment later, metal connected with the redhead's skull, and he collapsed to the ground. Without so much as a moment's hesitation, Nova hit him again to make sure he was out cold.

I tried to pull myself up and get over to him. Making it onto my feet was struggle, and I was only able to stay there for a second or two before Nova grabbed hold of my wrist and began pulling me towards my room. "Sasori! Sasori, un!" I screamed, trying-and failing-to get away.

It's not very surprising that I eventually ended up outside of my room. However, before throwing me in like he normally did, Nova slammed me against the door. My shoulder blades hit the metal and I inhaled sharply in an attempt to hide the pain. It was nothing compared to what had happened to Sasori, and certainly nothing compared to what Delsin had done. I shuddered.

"Sasori's really predictable, you know," the brunette began, his lips only inches from my ear. His breath tickled at my skin, and I desperately wanted to push him away. Hadn't they harassed me enough already? "Especially when it comes to you, Dei-dei," he continued, blowing on my earlobe. I threw my knee forward, and he easily caught it.

"Stop it, un."

"Fiesty." He twisted his head to the side so that I could hear the sound of his neck cracking before turning back to me. "That kid's got the hots for you, y'know. And since it's so obvious, of course we're going to take advantage of it." I scowled at him. Sasori was just my friend. Sure, we held hands and were kind of close sometimes, but most friends do that…

…Right?

My hands slammed against his chest, but he didn't budge. "I'm pretty sure he doesn't, un. Stop being stupid." After that comment, I wasn't surprised in the least when he struck me across the face.

"I'm going to disregard that and continue talking. Now don't interrupt me." Nova cleared his throat and rested his hand on top of mine. "It's pretty easy to rile him up when I act like I'm attracted to you, Dei-dei." I could have gagged at the pet name. "All it takes is a kiss, a few snide remarks, and a little bit of harassment to make him snap," he whispered, blowing on my ear again.

"You're gross. Get away, un." Another slap across the face. Like that was going to shut me up. Sasori was wrong, but now that I thought about it…trying to provoke him rather than me made a bit more sense. Not much, but enough for me to believe it.

Nova shrugged and shifted so that he was staring straight into my eyes. "Well, it was fun while it lasted. You'll probably get a brand new roommate soon enough. Won't that be great?" He paused for a moment to let out a short laugh. "I'll leave you with some time to get ready." The metal door was pushed open, and I was thrown inside.

Now all that was left was silence that I knew all too well. I tried to tell myself that it had been exactly the same for the past ten days, I couldn't believe it. Sure, it was quiet, but Sasori was always here. Always safe.

It was around then that I realized the full weight of everything that was happening. Sasori was in danger. In danger because he was protecting me. And for more than a week, I had been ignoring him, acting angry for no reason other than him snapping at me. Snapping at me when I completely deserved it.

Well, this was humiliating. I could feel my skin crawling, and I once again had to fight the urge to gag. Not only was I a slimy, dirty son of a bitch, but my best friend could have very well sent himself off to an early grave because of me. Awesome.

Why did he have to be so stupid? No, why did _I _have to be so stupid? If I hadn't acted so damn ridiculous before I went off to the experiment, he never would have followed me. We _never_ went to each other's experiments. It just didn't work that way; the blood and screaming was always too much.

And now, because of some stupid, irrational decision, he may very well die. And I'd never be able to see him again. _Wait_.

I'd never be able to see him again. Ever. He tried to stop Delsin, Nova smashed a bar against his skull…and…that could be the last I'd ever be able to see of him? I shook my head violently. No, that couldn't possibly happen.

But it easily could have. They were sick of dealing with him. Nova just told me so. They could find someone more cooperative, especially if they were just going to kidnap someone again. He was going to die, and I never even got to give him a proper farewell. Instead, I just moped around acting like I hated him. And for what? I knew he would have talked to me if I bothered him enough.

A few tears slipped from my eyes, and I quickly wiped them away. What was wrong with me? I pushed away the one person who actually seemed to give a damn about me in this entire place. He tried to befriend me, I screwed up, and I blamed him. Great. Just great. More tears. I tried to get rid of them, but that worked for all of five seconds before a fresh batch slid down my face.

Even now, I couldn't do anything to change the situation. He was back in that disaster of an experimentation, probably getting beaten to a pulp and all I could do was sit here. Sit here and hope that maybe, just maybe he'd come back. I didn't know how long it would be. A few minutes? Hours? It could have been days, even.

It couldn't have been more than five minutes since the whole thing happened, and I was already worrying myself sick. I could have asked myself something stupid like "why" to pass the time, but what good would that do me? I already knew the answer that; because I cared. Sasori was my best friend.

I had never had a best friend before. Unfortunately, it took me royally screwing up the whole thing to notice. It was pathetic, actually. I should have been able to realize that I was being an idiot.

Too busy wallowing in self pity to notice, though.

I stood up and slunk over to the right hand corner of the room before sliding down and pulling my knees up to my chest. Whenever something was wrong, I would sit here and talk to Sasori. He would sit either next to me or across from me and hold my hand, listening intently to everything I said. Sighing heavily, I grabbed a hold of my left hand with my right, giving it a tight squeeze, just like Sasori would have done.

"Sad, un," I murmured to myself. But yet, I kept gripping my hand. I knew I wouldn't be able to pretend he was here and act as if nothing was wrong. I wasn't that stupid. "Sasori, don't die, un. I promise I'll never do something stupid like this again. I'll be strong for you, un."

Yeah, like that was going to do anything. Could I have said anything stupider?

I opened up my hands and put them only inches from my face so that I could observe my brand new stitches. These ones were different, though. Rather than closing up cuts, Nova said that it was a "surprise." Essentially meaning that it was something awful. Since I had been unconscious, I hadn't been able to sneak a look at what it might be.

Well, there wasn't much left to lose now. I brought one of my hands to my mouth so that I could gently slice the strings apart with my teeth. While they were large and rather obnoxious to deal with, it didn't take much to break them. My teeth slid across the thick black string, and immediately, something slimy hit my lips.

I threw my hand back and yelped. What was going on? Cautiously, I looked down, unable to believe what was going on. In my open palm was a mouth, complete with teeth and a tongue. It seemed to have a mind of it's own; opening, closing, and sticking the tongue out at me.

"Hey, Sasori, I-" Oh. Right.

I could have killed myself right then and there. Why was I having such a problem all of a sudden? I hadn't talked to him in so long…but… "This is ridiculous, un…" I murmured, lifting my other hand so I could slice the strings away. This time, I managed to pull it away before the mouth's tongue could pop out and lick my face. They had distracted me for a little while…just until I tried to go back to my old habits of telling Sasori everything.

I had a feeling I'd be talking to air for a while. Sighing, I poked at one of the mouths, trying to smile as it bit at my fingers. It wasn't that funny, I just needed something to distract myself.

A few times, I felt myself drift off and jolt back awake, but only a few hours could have passed. My sleep patterns were too disturbed to last for a very long time. Surprisingly, there were no nightmares, even though I found myself constantly thinking of Sasori. I tried to picture how they had killed him, only to get rid of the thought as quickly as it had come. I didn't need to deal with that.

I tried to close my eyes and block out anything pertaining to Sasori and his surely gruesome death, but the more I tried to hide from it, the easier it managed to slip into my head. What if they had cut him up? Or tortured him until is body couldn't take it any more. Electrocution? No, that would have been to fast.

_Stop_, I told myself, but it did little good. The whole thing just made tired. Granted I was exhausted to begin with…

I felt myself beginning to drift off again, and I didn't even bother trying to fight it anymore. No one was going to bother me for a couple of days, anyway. That would be enough time to pull myself back together. Or at least that was what I was going to choose to believe. I-

"Deidara!" My eyes shot open. Did someone just call my name? I pulled my sore body up into a sitting position and looked around. Was I losing it? There was no one- "Dei!" It wasn't coming from my room. In the hallway, I heard frantic footsteps, followed by the doorknob being twisted hurriedly. What the hell? When the door wouldn't open, I heard a frustrated shriek, which was immediately followed by several loud thuds.

…I wasn't sure whether or not to be frightened, honestly. It definitely wasn't Nova, since he delivered me to my room only a short while ago, and Delsin normally wasn't so loud when he went through the halls.

Before I could think about it any longer, the door swung open, revealed a slimmer of light, and slammed shut once more. Without uttering another word, the figure rushed over to me and trapped me in a tight hug. The first thing I noticed was the stench of blood. Second, the familiarity of the hug.

I knew the embrace well, due to being hugged by the same person whenever I cried. But at the same time, I couldn't help but doubt it. "…Sasori, un?" I whispered, feeling the tears already begin to well up in my eyes again. Shoot, I thought I had managed to dry myself out.

"Shit, Dei, I'm so glad you're safe." It _was_ him. No one else called me Dei. But…how? My arms slipped around his torso, and I buried my face in his shoulder. A tear leaked from my eye, only to be followed by dozens not even seconds later.

I bit down on my lip hard enough to keep myself from sobbing, but it didn't completely stop my crying. He didn't seem to mind, though. The redhead was too busy pulling me against him and whispering about how glad he was that I was safe, and that he thought I had been killed.

I'm pretty sure that's what _I_ should have been doing. But I couldn't get any of the words out. We sat like this for at least five minutes before I could finally attempt to get anything out. "Sasori…I'm sorry, un…" I choked out before clamping my teeth down on my lip again. And really, I _was_ sorry. The entire thing was my fault, after all.

Rather than giving me a verbal response, Sasori put his thumb under my chin and tilted my chin up so that our eyes met. Embarrassed, I tried to blink my tears away. "Dei, I saw what happened."

"Obviously, un." Okay, maybe I could have given a better reply than that. It just slipped out, though. _I'm an idiot_.

But rather than show any sort of frustration, he sighed and wiped a few of my tears away. "That…uh…shouldn't have happened," he continued, acting now as if he didn't know what to say. "And…uh…I…w-well…I guess what I'm trying to say is…" Sasori trailed off, and I couldn't help but raise a brow. I tried to play it stupid, but all I could remember was what Nova had said to me earlier.

"_That kid's got the hots for you, y'know." _The words rang in my ears, and I tried to ignore them. But when the redhead's face started to turn the same color as his hair, I didn't know what to believe. "Un?" I grunted, urging for him to continue. Confused or not, I was curious as to what he was going to say. His normally calm brown eyes showed worry, which didn't help me any.

But either way, I was going to have to give him some sort of answer. I had to be honest and tell him how I felt.

What was that, though? Overall, he was nice (or at least I thought so), but he didn't have a problem yelling at me if something was wrong. The redhead had a short temper, he was impatient, but yet he always listened to me. Not very talkative, had a different view of art, but knew how to comfort me whenever I was upset.

So how did I feel?

"Um…I jut wanted to tell you that…OW!" I don't know which one of us jumped higher, but as soon as he shouted, we practically dove away from each other.

"What the hell, un?"

"I should be asking you that!" Wait, what?

"What are you talking about, un?" This was just getting weird, but at least it was buying me some time.

"You just pinched me!" I rose a brow. I did _what_? Sasori grabbed my wrists, and then I remembered. The mouths. I tried to pull back, but his grip on me was too strong. "Dei, show me your hands." I opened my mouth to protest, but almost immediately after, I recalled very nearly stripping him in his sleep to figure out what had happened during his experiment.

With a heavy sigh, I relaxed myself and let him pull my wrists forward and gently open my hands. I imagined that the presumed confession he began was about to come to a screeching halt.

A shame, too, considering that I had made up my mind.


	12. Chapter 11

I held Dei's open palm steadily, and I could tell that he was uncomfortable. Nervous, even. But at the same time, I was in a state of complete panic. His situation couldn't have been much worse than mine, I told myself before intertwining his fingers with my own. It didn't take a genius to figure out that he wanted me to let go. "Care to explain?" I asked, only to have him shrug and let me continue to stare at his palm.

There was a slit in the middle of his hand, and looked almost like lips. For a moment I could have sworn I saw it twitch, but that was ridiculous. Nothing like that would happen. I was just seeing things because I got hit too hard in the head earlier, or something.

"It's…pretty self-explanatory, un." Okay, evidently the two of us were on two completely different pages. "My hands, un." Well, duh. What else would I be staring at?

Right in the middle of my confession. I had built up so much courage (or insanity) to tell him. That's right. I was telling Dei that I was oh so very much in love with him, and doing quite a good job acting like a frightened teenage girl while I did so. Not going as well as I had hoped, unfortunately.

I looked down at his hands, and when I saw something move my first reaction was to let go of his hand and throw it back towards him. That was just…weird. Namely, a pair of teeth smiling at me, followed by a tongue brushing against my fingers.

It's kind of the last thing I'd expect, you know?

"…Mouths…" I managed to choke out, wiping the saliva off of my hand. My eyes were glued on Dei's hand, which he immediately tried to obstruct from my view.

"Yeah, un." I glanced back up to see Deidara staring at the floor, nodding slowly. And as soon as I looked at his one visible blue eye, I knew I had made a mistake. I just hurt him. In less than a minute, I had hurt him again. Without even thinking about it, too. His hands weren't any different from my puppet like body…I just didn't expect it.

In an act of desperation, I grabbed his hand, telling myself not to pull away as the hand mouth began attacking my skin. I was just going to have to endure it. And you know, looking back on it, now was not the time to go ahead and continue on with my confession.

Time was running out, though. I may or may not have killed Delsin, which meant that Nova was going to be back in here, and I had no idea when. If I was actually going to do this, I needed to do it now. So what was the problem? I wanted to keep talking, and Dei was already looking at me again, seeming to have accepted my silent apology.

I was scared. Scared that he was going to spit in my face and reject me.Just because he was attracted to men didn't mean that he loved me. I took a deep breath, trying to block out all of my insecurities. I needed to do this _now_.

"Okay, I'll try this again," I murmured. Reaching towards his face, I used my free hand to brush the hair out of his face so that I could see both of his eyes. "Dei, we both know that the last week or so hasn't exactly been the greatest…"

"Don't I know it, un," he said, smiling softly at me.

…I had no idea how to do this. This was bad. And on top of that, I couldn't even lie and say I had experience doing this. In my twenty three years of life-although it's quite embarrassing to admit it-I had never gone on a date. Never found someone that I was interested in romantically. "Well…" There was no way I could go back now, either.

"Yeah, un?"

I took another deep breath and gave his hand a tight squeeze, causing the hand mouth to quickly retract its tongue. "Dei, I love you." I don't know whether or not he saw it coming, but his eyes widened, and he began stuttering. I was hoping this was a good thing and not a bad thing. However, I immediately began preparing for the worst and tried to back pedal. "Um…I mean…I like you." Well, if that wasn't the sorriest thing I had ever done. My face was burning, and I tried to hide it, which I'm sure was a complete failure.

Thankfully, before I could ramble on any further and make a bigger fool of myself, Dei pressed his index finger against my lips and smiled nervously. I couldn't help but think of how stupid I was. What did I expect him to say? I should have thought this whole thing out a bit more.

"Sasori…" he began, and I could immediately feel my heart begin to speed up. The blond laughed softly and tapped my lips lightly with his finger before leaning closer to me. It would be a miracle for him not to notice the deep blush on my face. "It's okay…I like you, too, un."

I wasn't exactly sure what I was supposed to say next, but it felt like a huge weight had been lifted off of my chest. I didn't have to make the next move, because Dei pulled me closer to him and pressed his lips ever so gently against my cheek.

Before he could move away, my arms were locked around him and I kissed him full on the lips. For a moment, I regretted the decision, mostly due to the fact that he froze in place and did absolutely nothing. I was hoping that he just didn't know how to react, or was just nervous, or something. Hopefully not terrified of me now. But he had just said that he liked me, didn't he?

Without really thinking about it, I let my hands slide down his torso and latch onto the bottom of his tattered shirt. My fingers brushed against his stomach, and when he first began to move, I prepared for him to push me away.

But rather than freak out, one of his hands slipped up and grabbed my hair, deepening the kiss. I could judge from his movements that he had absolutely no idea as to what he was doing, but I couldn't say I was much better. Eventually, we broke the kiss and he let go of my head.

And since some much higher power decided that it would be much too simple to let me enjoy this one moment in my life, I couldn't help but think of what kind of a situation I was in. I just told Deidara I loved him. He said that he felt the same way. We kissed. Problem?

Nova was probably going to try and kill me, and if I were to guess, probably sooner than later. It was surprising that he had yet to come in here, but that only made it worse. What was I supposed to do now? If he killed me now…

I mentally slapped myself. _Don't think about it_, I tried to say to myself. But what good would that do? It was only going to make everything worse. "Dei…I should have told you this first, but…we have a problem."

Immediately, he pulled away from me. "You weren't kidding, were you, un?" I rose a brow. What the hell?

"No." He let out a sigh of relief and fell back against me. I suppose I could see why he would think of that, considering the fact that Nova and Delsin had been messing with him for a few weeks now. "Worse, actually." This time, he didn't say anything and just stared at me, waiting. "I…might've killed Delsin." And in that one moment, it seemed like everything froze. Dei was staring at me with a look of complete disbelief, laughing nervously.

"You…killed him, un? How?" he managed to get out, eyes searching my face for some sort of answer.

"I just…stabbed him." In the chest. With a giant metal cord. Viciously. But I didn't really need to add those details, did I? His eyes widened, and I didn't know whether or not he believed me.

Dei seemed to be thinking deeply about what he was going to say, but finally settled on nodding ever so slightly (like I'm supposed to know what he meant by that) and said "…Wow, un…" I was positive that he knew what this meant. Right now, the scientists and most of the guards were probably trying to figure out whether or not Delsin was dead, and if there was any way to help him at this point. As one of their most important scientists, this was going to be quite a massive blow to their organization.

To put the problem in simple words: I was screwed. "I…what are you going to do now, un? You can't die now…" he said softly, latching onto my hands. "Is there any way you can save yourself? There has to be something you can do, right un?" The questions kept coming one after another, all asking essentially the same thing. But it was a great question. What _could_ I do?

Run.

The idea suddenly hit me, and it was brilliant. No one had caught me yet, and I had broken down the door to get into our room…what were we even doing here now? If anything, we'd be able to hide somewhere else in the building when Nova came for me. And yes, I did intend on taking Dei with me. There was no way I was going to let him take the blame for what I did. Unfortunately, I had no idea where the exit was, but it probably wasn't all that hard to find. "We'll break out."

"What, un?" Dei had heard me, but didn't seem to be able to process it

"You know, get the hell out of here and run!" I exclaimed, jumping onto my feet. From the bewildered expression on his face, I drew the conclusion that the idea had never crossed his mind.

"That's fantastic, except…my legs aren't working all that great, un," he grumbled. I was hoping that it was some sort of sick joke, but I tried to get him to stand up, only to have him collapse like a ton of bricks, I groaned. This was going to be a problem. Thankfully, however, a problem that wouldn't be too hard to fix.

I bent over and slipped one arm under the blond's knees and wrapped the other around his waist. In one swift movement, I picked him up bridal style, only for him to immediately lock his arms around my neck. "Are you sure this is such a good idea, un?" Dei asked warily, tightening his grip on me considerably.

"Not particularly," I shot back, only to have him roll his eyes. The both of us knew that this could very well end up sending us to an early grave. But what did it matter at this point? Once Nova came in here, hell was going to break loose anyway. "Ready?"

He nodded. "Don't drop me, un." There was no way I'd do that. He wasn't very heavy, so carrying him wasn't going to be a problem. What I was really worried about was going to be my fighting ability. Sure, I had the cord in my stomach, but that worked better for long range attacks. If someone charged at me and got past it, I was going to be in a heck of a lot of trouble. "It's almost like a cheesy romance movie, un." Dei commented. "The princess is being rescued by her Danna, they escape from the antagonists and when they get out, they'll live happily ever after, un."

Yeah, if only it were that easy.


	13. Chapter 12

We weren't even halfway down the hall when I screamed for Sasori to stop. At first, he thought he had hurt me, or that I had seen a guard. He skidded to a stop, very nearly throwing me to the ground. I screamed, he screamed, and it was just a huge disaster.

Unfortunately, I couldn't say that he stopped for any of those reasons. What really happened was that I saw a blur of blue hair and faded clothing. "Konan, un!" Sasori gave me a weird look, and I could tell that he was about to start running again. Before he had the chance to, though, I tugged on his hair.

"Ow!" he cried out, tightening his grip on me. A rather fantastic plan came to mind, but I needed Sasori to cooperate if it was going to work. Due to my inability to walk, he needed to be my legs for this. "What? She just turned the corner, Dei." Exactly. I couldn't shout to her now. "We need to hurry, or-"

"Go get her, un!" I practically screamed, startling Sasori with my sudden raise in volume.

Unfortunately, this didn't get him to move. "We don't have time," the redhead told me, adjusting me so that he could continue on.

"Go. Get. Her." He looked down at me and rose a brow, silently asking why he needed to. "She can fight for us, un. Your hands are occupied, so what are you going to do, un? I assure you she'll be able to protect both us and herself, un." Actually, I was just making things up, but it wasn't that bad… This was for the good of another person, so that made it okay.

"You'd better be right, Dei," he muttered before turning on his heels and sprinting towards where Konan had disappeared. Practically flying around the corner, he stopped just in front of the blue haired girl, who was talking to a boy no older than me. His long black hair was tied tightly at the base of his neck, and two even scars that looked almost like tears ran down his face, almost right next to the inside of his eyes. Itachi Uchiha. The kid Kisame went off to room with when he got sick of me.

"Konan, un!" I screeched, causing her to immediately spin around in mid-sentence to look at me.

"…What are you two doing? Nova's gonna-"

"Yeah, we know. He's gonna kill us, un" She smiled, waiting for me to continue. Konan already knew by now that I was going to have more to say. "We're making a run for it. Come with us, un." The smile instantly fell from her face. Not good. I hadn't really planned for a negative reaction.

She looked behind her, then past us before speaking. "Are you two crazy?"

"Probably," Sasori replied, shrugging. "Not much to lose, so it's worth a shot."

"Not much to lose?" All three of us could tell that this wasn't going to end well. "You can't be serious!"

"I almost killed Delsin. Either make up your mind, or we're gonna have to go. Dei's the one who made me stay behind and try to get you to come with us," Sasori explained quickly. Both Konan and Itachi seemed equally shocked. "So?"

She paused for a moment and began to twirl a piece of her blue hair. I could tell that Sasori was getting really anxious. _Hurry, hurry!_ "Itachi?"

"Kisame and I will be fine ourselves." Hurry! Itachi turned quickly and began making his way down the hall. "We'll meet you out there." From the way he put it, it didn't seem like Konan was going to be given much choice in the matter.

"Don't you want to get out of here, un?" I asked, trying to convince her. We were losing time.

"Yes, but-" Before she could finish her sentence, the cry of a high pitched alarm went off. Immediately, her hands shot up and covered her ears. Like that was going to do anything. I knew she was going to go with us. There was no reason to even be waiting around now. "I can't take this, let's get out of here."

Things went pretty smoothly, until we were about maybe fifteen yards from the front door. I don't know if they had been watching us through some sort of video camera, but all of a sudden, people came pouring out in front of us. Not good

Why didn't we just stay in our room? "Maybe this wasn't such a-" Sasori didn't even give me a chance to finish my sentence before I felt something crawl under his shirt and shoot from the tear. It brushed against the middle of my spine, and tried to pull myself up. Out of sheer curiosity, I turned my head…Just in time to see Sasori's stomach cable tear through a man's neck.

Blood poured onto the floor, and…I laughed. I was as scared as hell, but I laughed. "Danna, kill them, un," I giggled, tangling my fingers in his hair. Danna? Where did that come from? Whatever. I just decided to flow with it. Another one fell to the ground, blood seeping from his now opened side.

They fell like dominoes, and Konan barely needed to lift a finger. I watched her from the corner of my eye, wielding knives disguised as papers. Clever. Most of the people she managed to catch didn't see it coming before it was too late.

The whole thing was beautiful, actually. One moment they're breathing, prepared to kill us, and the next their lives are slipping away. Quick and temporary.

Without waiting to make sure everyone was dead, Sasori continued on, jumping over dead bodies to get to the door. The cable retracted, completely drenched in blood. Before settling back into his stomach, it splattered on his stomach and the top of his pants. Ew.

The alarms had gotten louder since they first went off, and now, Konan constantly had her hands against her ears. I covered one ear and pressed the other against Sasori's chest so that I could still hold onto him. All of the blood, loud noises, the clashing of weapons, this was too much.

_I need to get out of here, _I said silently. I twisted a handful of Sasori's shirt between my fingers. He didn't seem to notice. Far too preoccupied with trying to pry open the front door.

Konan tried just pulling it open, but it didn't even budge. She pushed it, only to get the same result. "What the hell?"

"Break the hinges," Sasori suggested, shifting me in his arms so that he could reach out to try and help. This wasn't going to work. We were really low on time now. It had to have been at least five minutes since the alarms began to go off.

"You can put me down, un. I think we'll be fine for a little while, un," I offered. Considering that there were at least eleven dead bodies littering the floor behind us, we weren't in too much danger at the moment.

But as soon as he put me down and began to assist Konan, I realized something. Eleven bodies. Twelve people were there when the fight started. I recounted, hoping that I was wrong. No, there were eleven bodies there. "Danna, I think there's something wrong, un…"

I heard one of the hinges break, and the door let out a loud creak. "What?" he asked, not even bothering to turn around. Another hinge flew off of the door, and as he went to swing at the last one, Konan pushed him out of the way only a second before he made contact with it. It was a good thing she did, too.

A gun fired, and a bullet embedded itself into the spot where Sasori's head was only a moment ago. His eyes widened, and my head snapped in the direction the bullet had come from. "Shit, you really thought you'd be able to get away, didn't you?" The gun went off again, and a searing pain began budding in my shoulder. I cried out, slapping my hand over the spot. As soon as I felt the hole in my skin, I began cursing. No, not again.

From what he looked like, I could only conclude that he was barely alive. Blood dripped from his mouth and nose, and there were several deep gashes all over his body. How had he managed to get away without us noticing?

"Damn it, Nova, I thought I killed you," Sasori grumbled, stepping forward so that Konan could get to the last door hinge. One hit, and it moved ever so slightly.

Nova began advancing towards us, pointing the gun at Sasori. "Delsin's dead, you know. Died before we even got there." He stopped for a moment and smiled. "It's too bad we didn't think about the consequences of creating human weapons. We never thought anyone would be stupid enough to rebel." His finger slipped, and from the look on his face, I could tell that he accidentally pulled the trigger.

Sasori shouted, and I immediately heard the sound of splintering wood. Just as the brunette prepared to fire another shot, the hinge shot off of the doorway. Gunshot after gunshot rang out, but it didn't seem like Nova was aiming anymore. A few bullets grazed my skin, but nothing made direct contact. It was like he was completely losing it. And he'd been calling _me_ insane for all these years.

The brunette pointed the gun at Konan, breathing in short, frantic breaths. "Damn it, I'm going to ki-" before he could even get the words out of his mouth, Konan spun around and threw what looked like a small, pointed piece of paper at him. It wasn't until the item embedded itself in his chest that I saw a throwing knife.

His body collapsed to the ground, and Konan sighed. "If you were a little less chatty, you might've gotten us…" she murmured before turning around and placing her hands on the door. Not missing a beat, Sasori stood next to her and gave it a hard shove, sending it toppling over.

I was dizzy, and could barely process what was going on anymore. Blood seeped from my wounds, and I managed to see outside, but the pieces still didn't connect. Sasori picked me up again, and I immediately rested my head on his shoulders, not saying a word.

It was over. The whole thing seemed like it was unreal. I expected to be shot down or brutally murdered when we started this. How had we managed to get this far? They created Sasori's weapon, so wouldn't they be able to fight against it?

I didn't dwell on the matter much longer. "Danna, you did it, un," I whispered, pulling myself up to give him a light peck on the cheek.

"Yeah, I guess so."


	14. Chapter 13

And I thought the hall lights were bright. Seriously, the with the sun shining over head, I stared at the ground rather than straight forward. Ouch.

Once my eyes had adjusted, I couldn't help but notice that outside of the laboratory was surprisingly beautiful. Several flower patches were placed strategically around the building, and the grass around it was alive and well cared for. Maybe a quarter mile away, there was what looked like a thick forest with enormous trees and high grass surrounding it. Had I not been inside, I would have never guessed that this place was used for horrific experiments.

As soon as we stepped out, Konan and I made a run for it. There was no doubt that they were going to come looking for us. Not only had we been responsible for thirteen people (two of which were their most important scientists) but if word got out about their work, I'm pretty sure it would have destroyed them.

I glanced down at Dei, who seemed almost as if he were in a daze. With a blank expression on his face, he stared at straight ahead. What was wrong? We were finally free, and he looked more upset than when he was the lab.

"We'll hide in the woods for now," Konan instructed. "It's pretty deep, so if we get in, they'll never find us." I nodded and followed her, ducking under a few tree branches. The grass on the outside was a lot taller than I expected. Some patches reached my waist, while others were down at my ankles. It wasn't very well kept, but it was great for hiding.

As we headed deeper into the foliage, the sun began to hide behind the trees above us. It felt almost as if it had switched to nighttime in all of ten minutes. "Do you think Itachi and Kisame got out?" I asked, watching Konan sit down behind a bush before she completely disappeared.

"Considering how much attention we attracted, I'd be surprised if they didn't," Konan replied. "That and the fact that being almost six and half feet tall, Kisame towers over everyone in that place." That's true, when I met Kisame, he was rather tall. Tall, muscular, and menacing. Not someone I'd want to piss off.

I sat down as well, placing Deidara on the ground next to me. We were surrounded on all sides by either trees or grass, so it was safe enough to stop for a while. The blonde still didn't say anything, but had began to regain a little bit of life. "Dei, want me to try and fix the wounds?" I asked, motioning towards his bleeding arms. He shook his head, and I frowned. What was up with him? "Seriously?" He nodded.

"I'll be fine, danna." The blond had been calling me that since…about right before we escaped. I was hoping he knew what it meant, but I chose not to bring it up. I had more important matters at hand.

I sighed heavily and gave his knotted hair a light tug. "How about this; I'm going to fix you up whether you want it or not. Got it?"

He immediately began to protest. "But-" I gave him a look, silently telling him to back down. Surprisingly, he complied and took off his shirt so that I could see the damage. A few cuts, but only one bullet had gotten him.

Approximately fifteen minutes and several cries of pain later, I had him bandaged (courtesy of our shirts) and leaning against a nearby tree. I'd rather not go into detail about how I managed to fix his wounds. Since I have no medical experience whatsoever, I can just assure you that it was awful.

"You okay?" I asked once I was finished. He nodded, but the pained look on his face told me otherwise. Liar. "You sure?" Dei paused before shaking his head again.

"If I could walk, Nova wouldn't have almost killed us, un," he murmured. "We're lucky we even managed to get out, un." I rose a brow. This was weird. I didn't think he'd actually spend time worrying about something as trivial as this.

"Dei, it doesn't matter. We got out alive, and with minimal injuries at that," I said, trying to reassure him. When I had gotten shot, it didn't hurt. It was odd, to say the least. I definitely felt something snap or shatter, but…no pain. Probably from getting my body destroyed from all of their experiments.

"Yeah, geez, that could have gone a lot worse! If Nova hadn't lost it, we would have been screwed," Konan added, laughing soon afterwards. That was true. I don't even think I can properly describe what happened. He pointed the gun at me, then Konan, then Dei. However, when he actually fired it, the bullets were always far off from their mark. So far off that I honestly didn't feel I needed to put an effort into dodging them.

"But still, I was completely useless, un," Deidara muttered, frowning.

"Because they screwed your legs up during one of their tests. That isn't your fault." Instead of giving me a verbal reply, Dei shot me a half smile and rested his head on the grass. I smiled back and rested my hand on top of his. The blond mouthed a "thank you" to me, and I couldn't help but laugh. There was no need for that.

Konan wasn't looking, so I leaned forward and pressed my lips against his. Almost immediately, he began kissing me back. _Cute…_I thought before I brushed my tongue against his bottom lip.

"Well, well, looks like we've got a couple here," said a voice, which was immediately followed by a whistle. Deidara and I both jerked forward, smashing our foreheads against each other. We separated in a second, and I was pretty sure that my face was the same color as my hair. The two of us looked up to see Itachi and Kisame standing before us. The blue skinned man was smirking, while the other stood there with a bored expression on his face.

"Everyone's panicking in the lab, so we don't have much time," Itachi stated calmly. "We managed to get out through the ceiling, so I don't think they know we got out." The ceiling? I couldn't help but wonder how they managed it.

"We just went through the front door," Konan said, smiling. "Made a huge mess, too, it was pretty great."

"You got shot.""I'll live," she replied, shrugging. And then I remembered that yeah, she did get shot, didn't she? She must have been taking care of it over there. "More importantly, did anyone think of a plan for what we're doing next?"

The five of us exchanged glances, but no one was in a hurry to speak up.

"Homeless," Itachi said simply. I rose a brow. He must have sold himself here, too.

Kisame smiled sheepishly and began to scratch the back of his head. "I was in jail before this. Got into a huge fight."

"My parents don't want me to come back, un."

"My place got destroyed when they kidnapped me," I said, shrugging. Although I said it carelessly, I couldn't help but frown as I remembered my puppets going up in flames. I was hoping that the scientists would have at least spared my workshop, but they must have thought I wouldn't need it anymore.

Konan stared at us with both disbelief and amusement. "Cool. We've got this all thought out then." I heard Dei laugh softly at her sarcasm. For a moment, she seemed deep in thought, before resting her hand on the side of her face.

"Hey, we aren't the ones who came up with the idea," Kisame shot back, smirking.

Konan adjusted the flower in her hair before snapping her fingers."That's it! I think my siblings are still in Amagakure! Either that, or at least one of my friends still live there. I bet we could get some help from them." Everyone looked at each other before nodding. It wasn't like anyone could think of anything better.

Now of course, a plan like this was fantastic. The only problem being that none us actually knew where we were going. And to make matters even worse, Konan could barely tell her right hand from her left. We hit an old dirt road, which was a bit of improvement, but not even fifteen minutes later, we were back in the woods.

"I think we walked by that tree a few minutes ago, un," Deidara commented, pointing to a giant oak tree about three meters away from us. Now that he mentioned it, the tree did look rather familiar. Going with benefit of the doubt, I just told myself that it was a similar tree to the one he was talking about.

"Shut up! I know where we're going!" Konan growled, speeding up her pace considerably.

Itachi muttered something inaudible, I heard Kisame try to muffle a laugh behind me, and Dei rolled his eyes. This wasn't going as well as we had hoped.

"But…I could have sworn that…Oh, whatever, un," the blonde muttered, sighing in defeat. "We're totally lost, un."

"We aren't _lost_, Deidara. Just think of it as an adventure. A very long adventure." She said it with complete confidence, but when I got a look at her face, I could tell that she wasn't sure of what she was doing.

Yeah, we were completely lost. I kept my mouth shut, not wanting to freak her out anymore. That plan was working out quite well, until I saw the same tree Dei had pointed out only minutes before.

"Why don't we try going that way?" I asked, pointing to the right. I silently prayed that she'd listen. If this went on any longer, we were going to pass that stupid oak tree at least another dozen times before sundown.

"I thought we already went down there…" Konan murmured, but stopped and turned in that direction anyway.

"You said we were on an adventure, so it can't hurt to try, right, un?" Dei added, backing me up.

She looked at the both of us and smiled. "You're right. Onward!"


	15. Chapter 14

Had Sasori not suggested that we try a different route, we probably would have ended up camping under that stupid oak tree. It took them three hours to finally believe that we were circling it! Why didn't they believe me? Especially when they had no problem listening to danna.

Well, anyway, I think the only way I could describe the outskirts of Amagakure would be…disastrous. It wasn't until we got there that I remembered it had been the main battle field of a war not even ten years ago. The entire area was plunged into debt, and their town still hadn't managed to even start the rebuilding process.

There were still traces of fire everywhere, and a few times I could have sworn I had seen either human or animal bones.

The weird part? Konan wasn't even phased by it. In fact, she had taken to kicking what looked like a piece of what used to be either a hand or foot bone down the road as she walked. I kept silently hoping that it was just a rock, and that my eyes were playing tricks on me.

"Has it always been like this?" Sasori asked, watching a few homeless children scurry across the abandoned dirt road. Konan nodded casually.

"Everyone's used to it. It's gonna take forever to get fixed up, so there's no point in sulking over it," she stated simply. "Besides, it was worse in the labs, I think." I suppose that's one way of looking at it, but to completely dismiss the fact that there were people suffering in this abandoned place?

Or…at least I thought it was abandoned.

Konan took a sharp turn and led us down another road. Still within the village, she began looking at whatever house numbers she could find before coming to a stop in front of an old apartment building. "Looks just the same as it did before I left." Well of course it did. Everyone was dirt poor.

With the outsides covered in scorch marks and nearly all of the visible windows shattered, I couldn't help but wonder if anyone even lived there anymore. Konan insisted that they had, but she hadn't been in here in more than six years. As one of the laboratory's first test subjects, I couldn't help but wonder how she survived this long.

She pushed open the door to the apartment, and I was almost positive that it was going to topple over and crash to the ground. I thought that was bad…until she took her first step onto the wooden floor. Just by looking at it, I knew it wasn't going to hold. So needless to say, I wasn't very surprised when I heard the sound of splintering wood followed by a shriek.

"Whoops! Watch your step guys!" she shouted, pulling her foot out of the new hole in the ground. It was almost like walking on a landmine. Cool.

She told us to follow her, and we cautiously walked into the building, completely prepared to fall through the floor at any moment. We went up one flight of stairs without an issue, but when we came to the second one, Konan stopped suddenly, waiting at the bottom of the stairs.

"What're you doing, un?" I asked, walking forward. She threw her arm out to stop me and put a finger to her lips. I nodded and listened closely. Footsteps were rushing down the stairs.

Huh. Someone really did live here.

The footsteps grew louder, and about fifteen seconds later, a man in his mid-twenties came rushing down the stairs. Dressed in a plain white t-shirt and faded jeans, he looked completely normal. His spiky orange hair looked like it hadn't been brushed in days.

"Hm?" he grunted, looking up when he reached the bottom of the stairs. I quickly lifted my hand to keep my jaw from dropping. All over his face were at least a half a dozen piercings. Now, I couldn't exactly judge him, since Sasori's body acted like it were made of wood, and I now had multiple mouths on my body. However, the fact that it was self inflicted was bizarre.

Konan, on the other hand, didn't seem to notice a thing. The orange haired man stopped in his tracks only inches from her, taking in every detail of her face. At first, it was like he was looking at a stranger. Then, slowly, he tilted his head to the side and smirked. "Konan?"

Said girl dove into the man's arms, wordlessly holding him there. He must have known not to say anything, because he just stood there, arms wrapped tightly around her. I didn't want to make the assumption that it was her boyfriend, since the same thing probably would have happened with anyone else she had visited. Not seeing people for six years does that sometimes.

When they pulled away, his grey eyes scanned her face. There were no tears, but on the other hand, she didn't look ecstatic to be there. "I thought you were dead," he whispered, pulling her close once more. "I'll bring you up to my place." We followed silently, trying to hear them talk.

Everyone knew better than to say anything, so we just watched as they talked quietly to each other. I strained to hear what they were saying and even though they were only a foot or two from me, I couldn't hear a word. "Wait, what?" he said, loud enough for me to hear. Immediately, Konan began dragging him into his apartment.

"Long story. Guys, we'll be out in a couple of minutes, okay?" The door closed quietly, leaving us to stand there and wait. The couple of minutes passed quickly, soon turning into ten. Twenty. And then forty. What could they have been talking about in there?

Well, with six years to catch up on, quite a bit. It had to have been at least an hour before the door creaked open again, revealing a beaming Konan.

"Come find a seat. "She motioned for us to come inside, and without a word, we complied.

I can easily say that I was surprised at how open the front room was. There was plenty of space to sit, and even with six people in it, it didn't seem crowded in the least. Completely different than the rest of the apartment building. The walls were painted a warm yellow, and a few pieces of furniture and plants were placed around the room to make it seem more welcoming.

"To start things off, Pein said we could stay." So that was his name. Fitting, I suppose, considering that his face reminded me of a pin cushion.

A grin broke out on Kisame's face. "Sweet!"

"Hn," Itachi grunted, nodding once. He didn't exactly seem thrilled about it.

"Don't get too comfortable," Sasori murmured quietly, intertwining his fingers with mine. The redhead was right. This seemed too good to be true. It would be one thing if he had let Konan stay with him, since they had known each other before she left for the labs. But four people he had never met in his life? It didn't help that most of us were horribly mutilated in some way.

Pein stepped forward and smirked. "Yes, you can stay if you want. However, there's something I'd like in exchange for housing you." Yeah, I'd be surprised if he didn't.

Kisame chuckled. "So, you're not doing this out of the goodness of your heart, eh?" Of course he wasn't surprised. None of us were idiots. "What'll it be, Pein?"

"Don't agree to it so quickly," Itachi warned. "You don't even know what he's going to ask yet."

"You see, I know all about the labs; the creation of human weapons, torture, the crazy scientists…this isn't really news to me. What amazes me is how five of you managed to escape. I wouldn't have found it strange if just Konan got out…but how could they make this big of a mistake?"

"Get to the point," Itachi said, only to have Pein glare at him.

"I was. You see, they have no idea what they're doing now. Anyone skillful has either left or died, making it the perfect chance to retaliate." Oh? That was an interesting idea. I suppose it's not all that uncommon, but not something I'd think of.

"How so?" Sasori inquired. His grip on my hand tightened. This could either end really well, or really bad.

Pein shrugged. "Destroy a few buildings, get a few more people to help us out, and they'll never be able to recover. Something like that."

"So essentially," Kisame began, thinking about what the orange haired man had just said. "We're your henchmen."

"In a sense, yes." Even though it came across that we were nothing more than peons, nobody seemed to mind. We weren't being forced into it, and if we wanted to, we could leave.

"As long as I'm not being forced to put my life in danger, I see no problem with it," Itachi said. "I'll stay."

"Yeah, same," Kisame agreed.

Sasori wrapped his arm around my shoulders and pulled me closer to him. "What do you think, un?" I asked. I had no problem with it, since it seemed that we could leave whenever.

"Dei and I are staying."

Pein's smirked again and took another step forward. "Very good. In that case, we'll make plans immediately. What are your skills?"

We all thought for a moment. I couldn't think of anything until Sasori shifted his position so that he could pull up his shirt and reveal the stomach cable. Not even a moment later, Itachi took a deep breath before exhaling quickly. Rather than air coming from his mouth, a small bit of fire shot from between his lips. "Interesting, you two…Anyone else?" Konan inquired, visibly impressed by their abilities.

"Um…I'm massive, blue, and about six and a half feet tall," Kisame said, shrugging. Yeah, that summed it up pretty well. Even when I was rooming with him about a year ago, he looked like he could take on an entire football team. Pein nodded, and then turned to me.

What could I do? I had my art…but it was all at home. On the other hand, there might've been supplies around somewhere. "I make bombs, un," I said, smiling widely at him. Every single sculpture I made was beautiful, no matter what it looked like, it still exploded. It was brief, just like art should be. "I can make explosive clay, and…I have these, but I don't really know what they do, un." I opened my palms, revealing the hand mouths. They stayed shut for a moment before the tongues popped out and began licking at my skin.

"Yes…that's erm…interesting," Pein stammered, barely able to regain his composure before speaking again. "We'll have to make our first attack big. Something that'll warn them that we're coming."

"Should we have a name, un?" They needed to know who we were. That would make it all the more fun…knowing who we were but being unable to stop us.

Konan snapped her fingers. "How about…Akatsuki?"


	16. Epilogue

I sat on the branch of a large maple tree while Dei hung upside down beside me. His hair had gotten so long that he now tied half of it on top of his head. I thought it looked ridiculous, but he insisted on keeping it like that.

The laboratory we had previously been living in was within viewing distance, and everything looked peaceful. A shame it wasn't going to last, really.

Akatsuki had been going full force, and with several successful attacks, we were sure all of the labs new our group well. I looked down at my boyfriend, who had a small remote clutched tightly in his right hand. A twisted smile was on his lips, but I didn't worry about it any more. His fits had gotten better, only completely breaking down when he was under extreme stress. It was a huge improvement, really. "Danna, have you ever seen a roman candle, un? Because that's what this place is about to look like, un," he giggled before hitting the remote control.

At first, nothing happened, but I knew better than to doubt his work. About five seconds later, an earth shaking explosion came over the entire area, and I looked up just in time to see the laboratory blow apart. Flames began shooting through the roof, licking at whatever they could reach. While I sat there watching calmly, Dei was pulling himself back up into a sitting position with a wide grin on his face. "Was that a good one?" I asked. I still had no appreciation for his art, so I just asked him whether or not he liked the explosion after it had gone off. And each time, he'd give me the same answer.

"That one was really cool, un!" he exclaimed, throwing one arm around my shoulders. "The flames shot like, twenty feet high!" He was cute, I'd give him that much.

"I saw." The blonde rested his head against my shoulder, and I automatically began running my hands through his hair. "Ready to head back, Dei?" He shook his head, and I sighed. "Pein's going to start getting anxious."

He shrugged and wrapped his other arm around my torso."Then let him. I wanna stay and watch, un."

"Fine, but if he asks, I'm not going to take the blame for it."

"Fair enough, un." Dei let go of me for a moment. What was he doing now? The kid couldn't sit still for two minutes. I was going to question his actions out loud, but before I could, he let himself fall into my lap.

Since we had left the laboratory, he had put on some weight, giving him a much more healthy look. I slipped my hands around his waist, and he leaned against me. "Carefully, I don't want to fall out of the tree," I murmured, resting my chin on the top of his head. He nodded once, completely absorbed in watching the fire.

I chuckled softly and moved my hand to grab him by the chin. I gently turned his head so that he was looking at me. "Danna, un?" Must've been confused that I was distracting him from the fire. Normally, I'd just sit silently and let him watch. Without giving him a proper response, I pulled him forward and kissed him. Immediately, he kissed back, hands grabbing the back of my head. We broke away, and he turned back around. Snuggling against me, he let out a content sigh. "I love you, un."

"Love you too, Dei." No matter how many times we said it, it never got old. Each time, I loved him just as much.

Even though I couldn't view the burning laboratory as art, I was perfectly content sitting there with my love on my lap, tracing circles on my hands and watching the fire.


End file.
